VOL. XXXIII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. Q3 



The Observator says also, that, 884 years before Christ, I place the beginning 

 of the canicular cycle of the Egyptians on the vernal equinox, though that 

 cycle never begins in spring, p. 84, 85. But he is again mistaken. I meddle 

 not with that cycle, but speak of the Egyptian year of 365 days. 



The Observator represents, that I have a great work to come out: but I 

 never told him so. When I lived at Cambridge, I used sometimes to refresh 

 myself with History and Chronology for a while, when I was weary with other 

 studies: but I never told him, that I was preparing a work of this kind for 

 the press. 



Abbe Conti came into England in spring 1715, and, while he staid in 

 England, he pretended to be my friend, but assisted Mr. Leibnitz in engaging 

 me in new disputes, and has since acted in the same manner in France. 

 The part he acted here may be understood by the character given of him in the 

 Acta Eruditorum for the year 1721, p. QO, where the editor, excusing himself 

 from repeating some disputes which had been published in those Acta, subjoins: 

 " Let it therefore suffice to say, that when the Abbe Conti, a noble Vene- 

 tian, (of whom M. Leibnitz acknowledges M. Herman gave a good character) 

 came over from France into England, he undertook to be mediator in the dis- 

 putes between Sir L Newton and M. Leibnitz; and took the care of trans- 

 mitting their letters to each other." And how Mr. Leibnitz, by this media- 

 tion, endeavoured to engage me, against my will, in new disputes, about 

 occult qualities, universal gravity, the sensorium of God, space, time, vacuum, 

 atoms, the perfection of the world, supramundane intelligence, and mathema- 

 tical problems, is mentioned in the preface to the second edition of the Com- 

 mercium Epistolicum. And what he has been doing in Italy, may be under- 

 stood by the disputes raised there by one of his friends, who denies many of 

 my optical experiments, tliough they have been all tried in France with success. 

 But I hope that these things, and the perpetual motion, will be the last efforts 

 of this kind. 



On Camphor. Bij Mr, Caspar Neuman* Regius Professor of Chemistry, at 

 Berlin, and F.R.S. ^n Abstract from the Latin. N° 389, p. 321. 

 In this communication the author states, that he had obtained from the dis- 



* Caspar Neumann was a celebrated German chemist, and member of various learned societies. 

 He was born in l682. He travelled into Holland, England, France, and Italy; and on his return 

 in 1724, he was appointed professor of chemistry in the Royal Coll. of Physic and Surgery at Berlin ; 

 where he delivered a course of chemical lectures, annually. He died in 1737. Besides the above 

 and other papers inserted in the Phil. Trans, he published at different times select parts of his lec- 

 tures; which were reprinted after his death with large additions, in the German language. This 



