TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 101 



of air than others. Thus, in one instance, an egg', an inchoate animal, so to speak, 

 was liatched, producing a healthy chicken, after having- heen acted on by the 

 air-pump 26 daj-s, — a young bird expiring in about half a minute, a fish, the 

 minnow, in about an hour ; the frog and toad in about the same time ; the earth- 

 worm in about an hoiu' and a half; insects, such as the bee, dragonfly, and but- 

 terfly, after apparent death for more than an hour, recovering on exposm-e to the 

 air, and that repeatedly. 



By other experiments on birds by means of submersion in water, he showed that 

 different species varied greatly in ability to bear exclusion of air : thus, while all 

 the smaU birds of which he had made trial expired under water in a minute or less, 

 the buzzard lived about two minutes and a half; the common fowl about four 

 minutes and a half ; the goose and duck about ten minutes. 



Reasoning on the results, he infers tliat each indi\ddual animal has something 

 peculiar in its organization, determining its peculiarities of function or action- 

 peculiarities more readily described than accounted for. He holds the subject to 

 be, in a great measure, mysterious ; nor is he sanguine, referring to the new and 

 ingenious views relative to the genesis of species, that they will tend, except par- 

 tially, to enlighten the subject, considering that life itself is a mystery, and the 

 origination of life, as regards natural science, an unsolved problem. 



On the Phenomena of Life ami Mind. Bi/ Eobeet Dunn. 



Vocal and other Influences vpon Manlind, from Pendency of the Ej^iffhttis. 

 By George Duncan Gibb, M.A., M.D., LL.D. 

 The author gave the results of his examination with the laryngoscope of 4600 

 healthy persons, of all .ages, both sexes, and varying positions of life, which showed 

 that in 51.3 the epiglottis was found to be quite pendent, in place of a vertical 

 position. He determined that this was hereditary in many instances, for it was 

 found in the mother and her child. This made the percentage to be 11 amongst 

 Europeans ; but it was found to bo much greater in the natives of Asia and Africa, 

 280 of whom he had examined. The influences observed in Europeans were a 

 modiflcation of the natiual voice, which tended towards a bass tone in adult 

 males; the singing voice was materially altered, and in the female sex the higher 

 notes could not be produced at all in some persons, whilst in others it weakened 

 their vocal power and compass. Tlie author had never known a great female 

 singer to possess a pendent epiglottis. He contrasted the direction of the voice 

 in cases of erect and pendent epiglottis ; in the latter tlie voice strikes the back of 

 the throat, behind, instead of in front of, the soft palate. Young girls with pen- 

 dency can never expect to become singers of any note imless it be remedied, and 

 in them, and in boj's too, the A-oiee is not clear and silvery as it ought to be. Cer- 

 tain constitutional peculiarities were also noticed, and there was a predisposition 

 to contract the exanthemata and other diseases of an epidemic nature. The author 

 concluded by refen-ing to the large number of pendencies in Britain, over 3,000,000, 

 and the means to be taken to remedv it. 



Observations tvith the Spectroscope on Animcd Substances. 

 By E. Hat Laneestee. 



By means of dark bands produced in the prismatic specti'um (when light is 

 transmitted through coloured solutions) it has been shown, by Hoppe-Seyler and 

 by Prof. Stokes, of Cambridge, that various colom-ed bodies may be definitely re- 

 cognized. Mr. Sorby has also made many observations of vegetable colours, and 

 in\-ented a very convenient form of spectroscope. The author's observations were 

 made upon various coloured substances in the lower animals ; by this means he had 

 detected chloroph}d in Hydra and the fresliwater Sjwnyilla, which had before been 

 suspected to be present, but of which there was no certaintj^ In various worms 

 (Etnncc, Lmnhricus, Hlrudo'), in an insect-larva {Chironomus), and in a moUusk 

 (Phinorhis) he had found the same red substance (cruorine) discovered by Stokes 

 in tlie blood of man and vertebrates. This was remarkable, since the red matter 

 was deficient in nearly all mollusks and insects ; and, moreover, in vertebrates it was 



