THEKMO-DYNAMICS. 47 



very shortly into this subject, for I should have liked, if 

 possible, to have gone further, not only into the purely 

 thermo-dynamical work which has been done, chiefly by 

 Clausius and Sir William Thomson and the late Prof. 

 Rankine, but also into the Kinematic theory of gases in 

 which so much has been done especially by Prof. Clerk- 

 Maxwell ; but those who wish to study this subject further 

 will find the theory extremely clearly stated in Prof. 

 Clerk-Maxwell's admirable book on Heat ; and there are 

 some beautiful propositions which I hoped to explain to 

 you to be found in Rankine's book on Prime Movers, which 

 were published in the Philosophical Transactions of the 

 Royal Society of Edinburgh. 



The first law of thermo-dynamics is perhaps more easily 

 understood, but the applications of the second law are so 

 important that I have tried to spend a little more time on 

 them than on the first law. I am afraid I have gone too 

 rapidly over the subject ; but it is a very extensive one, and 

 I can only hope you will read up this portion of it which 

 I have spoken of. 



