276 



Irish : a fine one found near Harlech, in the year 1692, is 

 preserved in the Mostyn family in Flintshire. 



It has been supposed by some antiquarians, that the use 

 of these ornaments was derived from the Romans. But the 

 great number discovered in Ireland is opposed to such a 

 conjecture, and we may with much greater probability refer 

 them to a Celtic origin. It does not appear that they were 

 generally worn by the Romans ; and the very appellation 

 Torquatus, which was bestowed on Titus Manlius, from the 

 Golden Tore taken by him from a Gaul, whom he slew in the 

 year of Rome 393, and which was continued as a surname in 

 his family, seems to indicate, that the Torques was not 

 familiar to the Romans at the time. 



The Rev. H. Lloyd, V. P., laid on the table the stereo- 

 scope of Professor Wheatstone, and briefly explained the 

 information which it afforded on the laws of binocular vision. 



The President delivered the following Address to the 

 Academy. 



I have now the honour to inform you, that your Council, in the 

 exercise of the discretion entrusted to them by you, have taken into 

 their consideration, since the commencement of the present session, 

 the various papers which had been for a few years past communicated 

 to our Transactions, on several different subjects, in order to deter- 

 mine whether any and which of those papers should be distinguished 

 by the award of a Cunningham Medal : and that the medal for the 

 most important Paper in Physics, communicated to us during the 

 three years ending in March, 1838, has been adjudged to Dr. Apjohn, 

 for his Essay on a New Method of investigating the Specific Heats of 

 the Gases, published in the First Part of the Eighteenth Volume of 

 the Transactions of this Academy. 



The importance of the study of what are called the imponderable 

 agents, is known to all physical inquirers. Indeed it would appear, 

 that as the scientific history of Newton, and of his successors during 



