62 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1750. 



lemon juice neutralized with the salt of wormwood ; though this last acid be 

 considerably stronger than vinegar. 



7. Thus far have we considered the common neutral salts; which, however 

 powerful in resisting putrefaction, are inferior to some resinous substances, and 

 even some vegetables which he had tried. Thus myrrh, *in a watery menstruum 

 was found at least 1 2 times more antiseptic than sea-salt. Two grains of cam- 

 phor, mixed with water, preserved flesh better than 6o grs. of that salt : and he 

 imagined, could the camphor be kept from flying ofi^, or concreting to the sides 

 of the phial, that i gr. or even less, would have sufficed. An infusion of a few 

 grs. of Virginian snake-root in powder, exceeded 12 times its weight of sea-salt. 

 Camomile flowers have nearly the same extraordinary quality. The Jesuits' bark 

 has it also ; and if he had not found it so strong as the two substances last men- 

 tioned, he imputes that in part to his not being able to extract its embalming 

 parts in plain water. 



Now vegetables possessing this balsamic quality are the more valuable, in that, 

 being usually free of acrimony, they may be taken in much greater quantities 

 than either spirits, acids, resins, or even the neutral salts. And as in the great 

 variety of substances answering this purpose, there may be also some offensive or 

 useful qualities annexed, it may not be amiss perhaps to review some part of the 

 materia medica for this end. 



He adds, that, besides this extraordinary power in preserving bodies, he had 

 discovered in some of these substances a sweetening or correcting quality, after 

 putrefaction had actually begun. But these experiments he should lay before the 

 Society some other time ; with a table of the comparative force of salts, and some 

 further remarks on the same subject. 



y4n Attempt to explain an Ancient Greek Inscription, engraven on a Curious 

 Bronze Cup with 2 Handles, and published with a Draught of the Cup by Dr. 

 Pocoche, in his Description of the East, vol. ii. part 1, p. 207- By John IVard, 

 F.R.S. N''495, p. 488. 



The diameter of the cup on the inside is about 13^ inches ; and the inscrip- 

 tion is placed round the upper side of the rim. 



As jto the circular form of the inscription, we read in Pausanias of an instance 

 not very much unlike this. Iphitus king of Elis is said to have restored the 

 Olympic games, during which all hostilities ceased among the several states of 

 Peloponnesus. Throwing the discus or quoit was one of the exercises performed 

 in those games, and the discus of Iphitus was deposited in the temple of Juno at 

 Olympia ; on which the cessation of arms, always observed at that solemnity, 

 being engraved, was then publicly read. Which inscription, as the historian ob- 



