230 Proceedings of Philosophical Societies. [March, 



103° or 104°. In the ox it was 101°, while the venous was 100°. 

 These resuhs Mr. Davy considers as favourable to Dr. Black's theory 

 of animal heat, and likewise to the notion that the heat depends 

 upon the nervous energy. 



At the same meeting a paper by Mr. Ivory was read, or rather 

 announced, on the method of determining the orbit of a comet 

 from three geocentric observations. As this paper was only partially 

 read, it is impossible to give any account of it. 



LINNiEAN SOCIETY. 



On Tuesday, the 1st of February, a communication from Mr. 

 Reynolds Johnson was read, giving an account of two fossil alcyonia 

 found near Lyme. They were in flint, and in a very perfect state 

 of preservation, and enabled Mr. Johnson to make several additions 

 to our knowledge of the structure of this animal. 



At the same meeting a paper was read by Mr. Roscoe on the 

 class monandria. It consisted chiefly of strictures on Dr. Rox- 

 bourgh's essay on that class, in the eleventh volume of the Asiatic 

 Researches. 



On Tuesday, February 15, the conclusion of Mr. Roscoe's 

 paper, entitled Remarks on Dr. Roxburgh's Descriptiuii oj the Mo- 

 7iandrous Plants of India, published in the first volume of the Asi- 

 atic Researches, was read. Mr. Roscoe contends for the sufficiency of 

 the generic characters derived from modifications of the anther- 

 bearing filament of Seitamineae, as proposed by him in his essay 

 on this subject, published in the eighth volume of the Linnaean 

 Transactions ; and denies that Dr. Roxburgh's primary characters, 

 taken from diflcrcnces in the inner limb of the corolla, are of uni- 

 versal importance in this tribe of plants. He then proceeds to 

 remark on certain species described by Dr. Roxburgh, whose 

 phrynium dichoiomum he regards as probably not specifically diffe- 

 rent from maraiita arundinacea. His phryniuvi virgatum he is 

 inclined to refer to thalia genicidata. Both Dr. Smith and Dr. 

 Roxburgh have referred amomum repens of Sonnerat (the plant 

 producing the lesser cardamoms of the shops) to the genus alpinia. 

 Mr. Roscoe, however, is induced to agree with Dr. Maton, who in 

 liis observations on Mr. White's paper on cardamoms, published in 

 the tenth volume of the Society's Transactions, has proposed to 

 establish this plant as a new genus, under the name of elettaria ; 

 and on the authority of the published figures, Mr. Roscoe considers 

 it as differing from alpinia, not oply in habit, but in the structure 

 and appendages of its anther-bearing filament. 



VViih regard to Dr. Roxburgh's glohba radiralis, he adopts tlie 

 opinion of Dr. Sims, who in the Botanical Magazine (N° 1428) 

 has established this as a distinct genus, under the name of mantisca 

 saltatoria. Mr. Roscoe considers this genus as differing from 

 globba no less in the structure of Its filament tlian in its inflo- 

 rescence. 



