424 Royal Society of Edinburgh. 
and throwing additional light on the subjects investigated by Mr. 
Brown, in his papers on the Sexual Organs and mode of Impregna- 
tion in Orchide@ and Asclepiadee, of which abstracts were given in 
Phil. Mag. and Annals, N.S., vol. x. p. 437; and Lond. and Edinb. 
Phil. Mag., vol. i. p. 70. 
A paper was also read, containing particulars of the lives of the 
two eminent botanists of the early part of the last century, named 
Sherard,—especially of William Sherard, who founded the Professor- 
ship of Botany at Oxford which bears his name,—and of Dillenius, 
who was appointed the first professor upon that foundation ; derived 
from the papers of the celebrated Peter Collinson, and communicated 
to the Society by Aylmer Bourke Lambert, Esq., V.P.L.S. 
William Sherard was appointed English consul at Smyrna, where 
he made large collections of plants, which he brought to England 
with him, and with the assistance of his brother, James Sherard, 
commenced the preparation of his Pinax. James Sherard afterwards | 
became possessed of a botanical garden at Eltham, in which he cul- 
tivated the plants of the Hortus Elthamensis. 
It is mentioned as a point of some curiosity, that Dillenius, though 
attached to the study of mosses, which are among the most diminu- 
tive of plants, was himself “ tall and clumsy.” Notices are alse given 
of Catesby, author of the “Natural History of Carolina ;”” among these 
it is stated that the plates illustrating the works of both Dillenius and 
Catesby were all drawn as well as engraved by the authors themselves, 
and the works produced under circumstances of great discouragement. 
ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH. 
Feb. 15.—The award of the Keith Prize to Professor Forbes having 
been announced by the Council on the 18th of January, the medal 
was presented by Dr. Hope, the Vice-President in the Chair, ac- 
companied by an address to the following effect. 
The prize founded by ourlate estimable associate Mr. Keith, whose 
ingenious contrivances for self-registering thermometers and baro- 
meters are recorded in our Transactions, is, by the regulation of his 
Trustees, to be adjudged biennially for the most important discovery 
communicated to the Royal Society, or in the event of such being 
wanting, for the best paper which shall have been presented to the 
Society in the space of two years on ascientific subject. The Coun- 
cil, in discharge of the powers vested in them, have awarded unani- 
mously the Keith prize for the last biennial period, to Professor 
Forbes, for his paper ‘‘ On the Refractionand Polarization of Heat,” 
which they consider to come under that class of communications, 
which contain discoveries important to science. 
The Vice-President then observed, that the subject of heat is one 
so important to man, and so intimately connected with a variety of 
natural phenomena, that it has not failed to command a great de- 
gree of attention in all ages:—That an intimate connexion subsists 
between Heat and Light, and that much discordance of opinion has 
subsisted respecting the nature of both. He next stated the various 
opinions entertained concerning them, and particularly respecting 
