1855.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 245 



4. To know by whose advice and authority the niche has been 

 made in the Society's meeting room, to the obstruction of a proper 

 circulation of air. 



Communications were received — 



1. From the Government of India, enclosing extract from a dis- 

 patch by theHon'ble the Court of Directors, together with observa- 

 tions by Dr. Eoyle, on the Graphite or Plumbago of Kumaon and 

 Travancore. 



2. From Dr. J. Fayrer, Lucknow, Meteorological Eegisters kept 

 at the Lucknow Eesidency for the month of August to December, 

 1854. 



3. From Babu Radhanath Sikdar, abstracts of the results of the 

 Hourly Meteorological Observations taken at the Surveyor General's 

 Office, Calcutta, in the month of November, 1854. 



4. From Eaja Badhakanth Deb, communicating his thanks to the 

 Society for having been elected an Honorary member. 



5. From Dr. Campbell, a note on the Limboo alphabet, by Captain 

 Mainwaring. 



6. From Lieut. F. Burton, in command of the Somali expedition, 

 announcing despatch of some specimens collected by Lieut. Speke, 

 46 B. N. I., and enclosing a descriptive list of the fauna of the Somali 

 country. 



The following is an extract from Lieut. Burton's letter which is 

 addressed to Mr. Blyth, the Curator of the Zoological Department 

 of the Museum. 



"On the 18th October, 1854, Lieut. Speke, by my direction, landed 

 at ' Goree Bunder' (as our maps call it) in the country of the Warsangeli, 

 a large sub-family of the Somali nation. After much trouble and deten- 

 tion on the coast — carriage being with great difficulty purchasable in that 

 part of Eastern Africa — Lieut. Speke started inland towards the Wady 

 Nogal. 



" The country traversed by Lieut. Speke along the coast was a tract 

 of sand and limestone, thinly overgrown with jungle. Water was scarce, 

 only one well of pure water being found. Animals did not abound, a few 

 hyaenas, and jackals, gazelles, the giirnuk (gunnouk) antelope, and a little 

 land antelope were discovered. Besides gulls, there were very few birds. 



" The distance across the plain from the sea to the mountains, varies 

 from half a mile to two miles. On the 18th November, Lieut. Speke 

 ascended the hills by the bed of a mountain-stream, the only ' Pass' known 



