56 Royal Society : — 



to improve the valuable edition published iu 1824 by the late 

 Mr. Richard Price. 



For many years he represented the ward of Farringdon 

 Without (in which his business premises were situated), iu the 

 Common Council of the City of London, and constantly paid 

 strict attention to his representative duties. Of all the objects 

 which came under his cognizance in this capacity there were 

 none which interested him more deeply than questions con- 

 nected with education. He took an active part in the foundation 

 of the City of London School, and warmly promoted the esta- 

 blishment of University College and of the University of Lon- 

 don. His politics were decidedly liberal j but his extended 

 intercourse with the world, and the natural benevolence of his 

 character, inclined him to listen with the most complete tolerance 

 to the opinions of those who differed from him ; and he reckoned 

 among his attached friends many whose political opinions were 

 sti'ongly opposed to his own. 



Early in the summer of 1852 his health gave way, and he 

 found it necessary to withdraw from the excitement of active 

 life. He settled down at Richmond, and once more gave him- 

 self up to Ovid, Virgil, and his old friends Paulus Manutius, 

 Justus Lipsius, Ochinus, Fracastorius, &c. Increasing years 

 brought increasing feebleness ; and the severe weather of No- 

 vember last brought on an attack of bronchitis, of which he 

 died suddenly on the 1st of December, in the seventy-eighth 

 year of his age. — J. J. B. 



VIII. Proceedings of Learned Societies. 



ROYAL SOCIETY. 

 [Continued from vol. xvi. p. 542.] 

 June 10, 1858. — The Lord Wrottesley, President, in the Chair. 

 nr^HE following communications were read : — 

 -■- " On the formation of Continuous Tabular Masses of Stony 

 Lava on steep slopes ; with Remarks on the Mode of Origin of 

 Mount Etna, and the Theory of ' Craters of Elevation.' " By Sir 

 Charles Lyell, F.R.S. &c. 



The question whether lava can consolidate on a steep slope, so as 

 to form strata of stony and compact rock, inclined at angles of from 

 10° to more than 30°, has of late years acquired considerable im- 

 portance, because geologists of high authority have affirmed that 

 lavas which congeal on a declivity exceeding .5° or 6° are never con- 

 tinuous and solid, but are entirely composed of scoriaceous and frag- 

 mentary materials. From the law thus supposed to govern the con- 

 solidation of melted matter of volcanic origin, it has been logically 

 inferred that all great volcanic mountains owe their conical form prin- 

 cipally to upheaval or to a force acting from below and exerting au 



