42 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[July 13- ii 



but preparations are being made by Mr. Torrance, the 

 manager, to have the water pumped out, and operations 

 started again. The limestone is a hard, beautifully 

 laminated rock. It was very likely deposited in a small 

 loch into which a stream flowed whose waters were 

 highly saturated with carbonate of lime, which had been 

 precipitated owing to the escape of carbon dioxide and 

 evaporation. The spring had likely been of volcanic 

 origin. Very few fossils were found by the party. The 

 well-known carboniferous plants are of course those that 

 characterise the bed, and a few slabs with scales of 

 lepidodendra and the allied genera were seen, mostly on 

 sheets of shaly blaze that crumbled on being touched. 

 One quarryman brought forward in triumph what he 

 described as a fossil — a small slab studded with crystals 

 of calcite. The party were taken to the office attached 

 to the quarries, and were there shown a few of the fossils 

 said to have been found in the beds. The chief specimen 

 was a well-known brachiopod, Prodi tela gigantea, a 

 marine fossil, which, it turned out, had come from 

 Kirkcaldy. The museum also contained lumps of 

 dolomite, steatite, copper and iron ore — from Norway. 

 After inspecting the quarries and these products, the 

 company went on to the oilworks at Oakbank, and 

 were shown over the works and initiated into all the 

 mysteries of that complicated process of chemical de- 

 composition by which all the various commercial 

 products of shale are elaborated. 



GEOLOGICAL CLASS, EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY. 

 The last excursion for this session took place under the 

 guidance of Professor Geikie to Innerwick on Saturday. 

 After examining the carboniferous beds at Innerwick, the 

 class proceeded along the coast to the cove, where were 

 seen the stacks and arches produced in the old red sand- 

 stone by marine erosion, also some fine sections showing 

 the false bedding. They afterwards visited Siccar Point, 

 where one of the finest examples of unconfirmity in 

 Scotland between the old red and Silurian was inspected. 

 The crumpling and folding of the latter, and their subse- 

 quent long exposure to denudation before the deposition 

 of the sandstone were clearly demonstrated. 



BEWICKSHIRE NATURALISTS' CLUB. 

 The second field-meeting of this club was held 

 at Kirknewton on the 27th ult. A visit was paid 

 to the pele tower at Heathpool Farm ; very 

 little of the tower is left, but the remains of 

 an old spiral staircase attracted much attention from the 

 size and condition of the stones. A move was next 

 made for Coupland Castle, now composed of an old pele 

 tower and an adapted farmhouse, with a modern building 

 intervening. A fireplace in the pele tower bears date 

 1619. The party then returned to Kirknewton and 

 inspected the curious church. There is evidence of a 

 Norman edifice having stood on the same site. During 

 the times of Border strife that building was destroyed, 

 and for some time the site remained unoccupied. 

 Subsequently a pele tower was erected, and in a more 

 peaceable period a second church was erected, the vault 

 of the tower being used for the chancel, a feature which 

 makes the edifice peculiarly interesting. 



The Parisian Bill of Fare. — The consumption of 

 horse-flesh in Paris for the year 1887, according to La 

 Nature, exceeded eight million pounds. 



THE SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE 

 BABYLONIANS. 



Abstract of a Course of Lectures delivered by Mr. 

 G. Bertin, M.R.A.S., at the British Museum. 

 Fourth Lecture — Laws. 



WHEN a new nation is formed, either by conquest 

 or by revolution, it generally adopts the laws of 

 the preceding society. The Semites, however, when 

 they invaded Mesopotamia found only savage popula- 

 tions, and they brought from their first home no codified 

 laws, for as they were divided into small tribes or king- 

 doms, traditional customs and what may be called 

 natural laws had sufficed ; nor did the arrival of the 

 Akkadians bring any change to this state of things. 

 After the two races had amalgamated there appears to 

 have been an attempt at a codification of the unwritten 

 laws. Whether it was the work of a wise king or that 

 of a philosopher, as happened in Greece, or that of a 

 number of legislators deputed by the people, we are not 

 able to say. The date of this codification is even un- 

 certain, it can only be said that it was anterior to Sargon 

 of Agade (about 3,000 b. a), and that it was probably 

 the work of Akkadian speaking legislators, for these laws, 

 or rather precepts, were written in Akkadian and trans- 

 lated by order of Sargon. 



In these precepts — for they are more precepts than 

 laws — the legislator considers man under his three most 

 important aspects : first as a private individual, second 

 as an agriculturist, third as a trader. The two first 

 treatises or tablets have come down to us nearly com- 

 plete. In the first are stated the duties of man in his 

 private life; these we have already considered. In the 

 second are enumerated the rights and duties of the agri- 

 culturist, the methods he is to use in the cultivation of his 

 field, and the different kinds of tenures ; the tablet gives 

 also a list of the furniture, implements, utensils, etc., 

 which constitute the plant of a farm. The third tablet, 

 though much mutilated, appears to be a treatise on pro- 

 perty. It speaks of the different kinds of holdings by con- 

 tract for a limited period, or for life, or by purchase with- 

 out reservation ; of the possession of slaves, horses, and 

 other animals ; of the power of the owner had over them, 

 and of the way in which other people were to assist 

 him in capturing fugitive slaves; and of the defects 

 making a contract void. It treats also of payments, 

 loans, and interest on money. 



These three treatises were the base of the Babylonian 

 laws ; they formed the first text-book of the f cribe in his 

 early education, and were always consulted by the inter- 

 preters of the law. 



With the progress of thesociety new wants were felt and 

 new points were raised in the courts of laws ; these 

 were met by edicts of the king or orders of the governors 

 of towns ; but more often the new points raised in the 

 courts of law were decided in tl e same way as with us ; 

 the sitting magistrate, with the assistance of some of his 

 colleagues, after a careful examination of the case, de- 

 cided according to the best of his ability and gave judg- 

 ment. This decision constituted a legal precedent, which 

 had force of law if similar cases were brought before the 

 court. There is in the British Museum a tablet on 

 which a scribe has inscribed a certain number of such legal 

 precedents ; one, for instance, states that if a man make 

 a contract in the name of another, such contract shall be 

 void unless he has a power of attorney. Another states 

 that if a man has promised to give his daughter in mar- 



