for the year 1870. xxvii 



comparative expense, and perhaps some other drawbacks, 

 in increasing use by the local meat-preserving companies. 



No doubt improved methods will before long be reduced 

 within practicable limits, but in the rneantime the vitality 

 of the enterprise is shown by its steady growth, unassisted 

 as yet by any available new method. 



A requirement, subsidiary to the new meat-preserving 

 industry, of considerable importance on account of its 

 economic sense and sanatory bearings, concerns the 

 disposal of the waste meat and animal refuse, a con- 

 siderable bye-product of the manufacture. The recently- 

 patented method of Mr. George Foord deals with this sub- 

 ject. The method, I am informed, is about to be put in 

 operation by the firm of Messrs. James Macmeikan and Co., 

 who are building a large factory, and providing powerful 

 plant for earring it on. 



The sanatory bearing of the action employed in this 

 patented process of Mr. Foord, by which putrefactive and 

 fermentative decays are suppressed by the use of sulphuric 

 acid, does not appear to have been hitherto recognised. It 

 may in the future admit of important applications in various 

 matters of public hygiene. 



In looking back on the progress of science generally dur- 

 ing the past two years, it cannot but be remarked that out 

 of all the rest the additions to our knowledge of solar physics 

 stand out the most prominent. On the occasion of our last 

 inaugural meeting, I called your attention to the then 

 approaching total solar eclipse of May, 1869, which would 

 be visible over a part of India and the Indian seas. This 

 eclipse, as you will remember, was a remarkable one, from 

 the long duration of the total obscuration, which offered an 

 unusually favourable opportunity for the examination of the 

 strange phenomena generally witnessed on such occasions. 

 The eclipse was successfully observed, the results were 



