A72 Royal Society :— 
interrupted. Similar occurrences, although with a converse effect, 
have happened in earlier times ; and two instances are mentioned 
by Holland, in one of which, near Bickley, and also m the neigh- 
bourhood of Combermere Abbey, the ground suddenly sank toa 
depth of many feet, and the brine not being removed with the 
same rapidity as in the present day, forced its way to the surface 
upon its old subterranean channel or reservoir being filled up, 
and formed a pool of considerable size in the depression caused 
by the collapse of the strata. 
The failure of 1856 appears to have been partial only, as would 
be naturally expected if due to the alleged cause ; it seems to have 
been almost wholly confined to the Northwich district: at Wins- 
ford it was slightly felt, but was there attributed more to in- 
creased pumping than to any natural cause; whilst in the Sand- 
bach department I believe no complaint of any kind was raised. 
The derangement, such as it was, seems to have been only tem- 
porary, for no complaints have since been made of the occurrence 
of any scarcity. 
LIV. Proceedings of Learned Societies. 
ROYAL SOCIETY. 
[Continued from p. 397.] 
March 26, 1857.—Major-General Sabine, R.A., Tr. and V.P., in the 
Chair. 
HE following communication was read :— 
“On an Element of Strength in Beams subjected to Trans- 
verse Strain, named by the author ‘The Resistance of Flexure.”’ 
By William Henry Barlow, Esq., F.R.S. 
In his former paper on this subject the author pointed out the 
existence of an element of strength in beams when subjected to trans- 
verse strain,—the resistance of flexure—which had been omitted in 
the generally received theory ; and the object of the present experi- 
mental inquiry is to elucidate more clearly the general bearing of 
the subject, and determine more precisely the laws which govern 
this resistance. 
The forms of beam employed in the experiments formerly de- 
scribed were only of two kinds—solid rectangular bars and open 
girders ; in the present experiments other forms have been used, 
namely, square bars broken on their sides, square bars broken on 
their angles, round bars, beams of the I section broken with the 
flanges horizontal, and similar beams broken with the flanges ver- 
tical #. 
The results of these experiments are exhibited in Tables, together 
with those of the former series; and the author employs them, in 
the first place, to test the accuracy of the existing theory, by com- 
paring the resistance of the outer fibres or particles of each of the 
forms of beam, calculated on that theory, with the actual tensile 
