131 



cal inform with a variety of the Australian instrument) taken 

 from the antique, one of which appeared to have been in- 

 tended to represent the Herculean weapon. A further con- 

 firmation was drawn from the fact, that instruments, formed 

 on the model of these, were found to exhibit the peculiar 

 flight of the boomerang. So also of the club or hammer of 

 Thor, the Hercules of Scandinavian mythology, stated in 

 the Edda to have possessed similar properties ; instruments 

 of a +, and hammer shape, being also found to exhibit all 

 the peculiarities of the Australian weapon. Hence, an 

 illustration of the crosses on Pagan British coins, and of 

 the tradition of cruciform missiles still preserved in Irish 

 romances. 



The connexion between the curved club and the boome- 

 rang being thus established, it was suggested, that some 

 relationship might be looked for between the Germanic 

 nations, who still call their club keile and Jciele, a name 

 properly descriptive of a crooked weapon, and the Austra- 

 lian tribes who call the cognate instrument Itiliee. 



From the remarkable fact, that the names of the straight 

 spear in several of the languages of Europe are either iden- 

 tical, or radically connected, with these characteristic names 

 of the crooked missile, it was argued that the boomerang is 

 a more ancient weapon than the spear. 



DONATIONS. 



Astronomical Observations made at the Observatory of 

 Cambridge. By the Rev. James Challis, M. A. Vol. IX., 

 for the year 1836. Presented by the Author. 



Address of His Royal Highness the Duke of Sussex, 

 K. G., $c. fyc. 8fc., the President, read at the Anniversary 

 Meeting of the Royal Society on Thursday, November 30th, 

 1837. Presented by the Society. 



Guilielmi Gilberti, de Magnete, Magneticisque Corpori- 

 bus, et de Magno Magnete Tetture ; Physiologia nova, plu- 



