Dr. Martyn on the Function of the Thyroid Body. 69 
contain such sequence 7 times repeated, it is then said to be m-ly 
irreversible. In consequence of this multiplicity of distinctions, the 
author’s final results are necessarily very complicated, and cannot be 
exhibited in an abstract; they appear, however, to contain a com- 
plete solution of the problem, i.e. to afford the means of finding, 
without anything tentative, the number of the /-partitions of an 
r-gon when &# and r are given numbers. 
December 18.—The Lord Wrottesley, President, in the Chair. 
The following communications were read :— 
“On the Scelidothere (Scelidotherium leptocephalum, Owen), a 
large extinct Terrestrial Sloth.’ By Professor R. Owen, F.R.S. 
“On the Evidence of the existence of the Decennial Inequality in 
the Solar-diurnal Variations, and its non-existence in the Lunar-diur- 
nal Variation of the Magnetic Declination at Hobarton.”” By Major- 
General Sabine, R.A., D.C.L., Treas. and V.P.R.S. 
In a communication made to the Royal Society in the last Session, 
“On the Lunar-diurnal Magnetic Variation at Toronto,” the author 
had stated that he could discover no trace of the lunar influence of 
the decennial inequality which constitutes so marked a feature in the 
solar magnetic variations. He has since read, in a memoir commu- 
nicated to the Imperial Academy of Sciences at Vienna, entitled “On 
the influence of the Moon on the horizontal component of the Mag- 
netic Force,” that M. Kreil is of opinion that the observations of 
different years at Milan and Prague, when combined, would rather 
favour the contrary inference, viz. that the decennial inequality exists 
in the lunar as well as in the solar variations. The author was led 
therefore to re-examine this question by the aid of the observations 
of the Declination at the Hobarton Observatory, which he considers 
to be remarkably well suited for the purpose, as they comprise eight 
years of consecutive hourly observation with unchanged instruments 
and a uniform system of observation, and number, exclusive of 
Sundays, Christmas-days, and Good Fridays, and occasional but very 
rare omissions, no less than 51,998 observations. i 
These observations have been examined by the processes already 
described in the author’s communication of last Session, and the 
results form the subject of the present paper, showing, in the author’s 
belief, decided and systematic evidence of the existence of the diurnal 
inequality, having its minimum epoch in 1843-1844, and its maximum 
epoch five years later, in the mean diurnal variation due to the dis- 
turbances and in the more regular and ordinary solar-diurnal varia- 
tion, and the absence of any trace of a similar inequality in the 
lunar-diurnal variation. 
January 8, 1857.—William Robert Grove, Esq., V.P., in the Chair. 
The following communications was read :— 
“On the Function of the Thyroid Body.” By Patrick Martyn, 
Esq., M.D. Lond,, Surgeon R.N. 
After referring to the form, situation, connexions and internal 
