230 Royal Society. 



bent pressure of the column of air. And for the physiologist : — 

 Animal heat appears to be caused by the pressure of air in the lungs. 

 And for the botanist: — The ascent of sap, and the general upward 

 tendency of trees and plants, are due to atmosjiheric pressure, which 

 is greatest at the roots ; the trees and sap ascend, as a balloon in 

 air, or as a piece of wood iu water ! 



" It is generally thought that in electrolytic decomposition the 

 gases called oxygen and hydrogen are somehow formed from the 

 water ; " but this is not at all our author's opinion. He thinks they 

 are derived from the atmosphere, and that they come from the bat- 

 tery through the conducting wires ; and further, that it is the con- 

 fluence and pressure of these two aeriform fluids which produce the 

 electric light, the incandescence of M'ires, and the other calorific and 

 luminous phenomena of the circuit. 



"Light," says Mr. Woodhead, "can be caught and examined." 

 There is no salt used in the process, and herein Mr. Woodhead's 

 experiments differ from certain of our own made on sparrows and 

 cockrobins at the beginning of the present century. He ' catches ' 

 the light by ingeniously entrapping it in sealing-wax. Again, solar 

 light is the power which moves the earth, both on its axis and in its 

 orbit, and seems also to regulate the motions of the planets. More 

 solar light appears to impinge upon the earth at the solstices than at 

 the equinoxes, which Mr. Woodhead sagaciously supposes may ac- 

 count for the variation of the earth's distance from the sun. Sir 

 John Herschel Avill no doubt be interested to learn all this ; he will 

 henceforth be able to assign their proper value — or no-value — to the 

 experiments of Mr. Bennet, while a new life begins to palpitate 

 under the ribs of the defunct corpuscular theory ! 



It is Leigh Hunt, if we remember aright, who insists on the ne- 

 cessity of contrast in the composition of what is called humour ; such 

 a contrast, we imagine, exists when we behold a man talking extreme 

 nonsense with a grave face ; and as a choice specimen in this line, 

 we can conscientiously refer to the book of Mr. Woodhead. 



XXXV. Proceedings of Learned Societies. 



ROYAL SOCIETY. 



[Continued from p. 153.] 



April 29. " pURTHER Experiments on Light." By Henry Lord 



1852. •*- Brougham,F.H.S.,Memberof the Institute of France, 

 and of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Naples. 



The author commences this account of his experiments by remark- 

 ing, that " it is probable that some may consider the inference to be 

 drawn from the following experiments as unfavourable to the doc- 

 trines of my former paper — I think I can explain the phenomena 

 according to those doctrines — but be they ever so repugnant, we are 

 of course in search of truth, and have no right even to wish that the 

 balance may incline one way rather than another, far less to conceal 

 any facts which may aifect its inclination." 



The leading experiment is this : — A speculum is placed in a beam 



