68 Scientific Notices — Chemistry. [July, 



pass along the coast by sea, and experienced everywhere the 

 greatest attention from the officers of the French customs. The 

 paper briefly describes the leading geological features of the 

 coast, reciting the partial descriptions already published, and 

 referring, for an account of the cliffs near Hastings, to a me- 

 moir by Mr. Webster, read at the last meeting of the Geolo- 

 gical Society ; and for a detail of the beds which form the cliffs 

 from Gris Nez to Equihen, to an account of the lower Boulon- 

 nois to be read at a future meeting. From Equihen to the 

 mouth of the Somme, the coast is altogether occupied by dunes 

 of sand, the sand hills being, in some places, especially in the 

 vicinity of Etaples, more than 100 feet in height. These hills 

 are, in general, somewhat crescent shaped, the back of the 

 crescent being turned towards the prevailing wind, and the 

 slope on the lee side much more rapid than the opposite one. 

 The immediate base of the dunes seems to be peat, which is 

 found both on the land side of them, and without, just on the 

 verge of the sea, and in some places, below the level of high 

 water : but no rocks have yet been discovered along the coast 

 beneath the dunes. A list of heights obtained by the barometer 

 is subjoined to this paper, and some detached sketches are an- 

 nexed to it of interesting geological appearances on the French 

 shore. 



Article XIV. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTICES. 



Chemistry. 



1. On the Nature of the free Acid ejected from the Human 

 Stomach in Dyspepsia. 



Our readers know from the notice of the proceedings of the 

 Royal Society in the Annals of Philosophy (Feb. 1824), that in 

 December last, Dr. Prout read a paper before that learned 

 body, the object of which was to prove, that the acid usually 

 found to exist in the stomach of animals, during the digestive 

 process, is the muriatic. An acquaintance of mine, who occa- 

 sionally suffers severely from dyspepsia, and was somewhat scep- 

 tical as to Dr. Prout's conclusions, lately requested me to exa- 

 mine the fluid ejected from his stomach during a violent dyspep- 

 tic paroxysm the day before, with the view of ascertaining the 

 nature of the free acid it contained. 



The fluid which had been thrown from the stomach in the 

 morning, fasting, when filtered, was perfectly clear, and nearly 

 colourless ; it gave a decided red tint to litmus paper. I dis- 

 tilled about six ounces of it almost to dryness, at a gentle heat, 

 receiving the product in three separate and nearly equal portions. 



