PROCEEDINGS 



OF 



THE ROYAL SOCIETY. 



1836. No. 25. 



April 2i, 1836. 



RODERICK IMPEY MURCHISON, Esq., Vice-President, in the 



Chair, 



A paper was read, entitled " Additional Observations on Voltaic 

 Combinations." In a letter addressed to Michael Faraday, Esq., 

 D.C.L., F.R.S. Fullerian Professor of Chemistry in the Royal Insti- 

 tution, &c. By J. Frederick Daniell, Esq,, F.R.S., Professor of Che- 

 mistry in King's College, London. 



The author has found that the constant battery, of which he de- 

 scribed the construction in a former communication to the Royal So- 

 ciety, might be rendered not only perfectly steady in its action, but 

 also very powerful j as well as extremely efficacious and convenient 

 for all the purposes to which the common voltaic battery is usually 

 applied. With this view he places the cells which form the battery 

 in two parallel rows, consisting of ten cells in each row, on a long 

 table, with their siphon-tubes arranged opposite to each other, and 

 hanging over a small gutter, placed between the rows, in order to 

 carry off the refuse solution when it is necessary to change the acid. 

 Having observed that the uniformity of action may be completely 

 maintained by the occasional addition of a small quantity of acid, he 

 is able to dispense with the cumbrous addition of the dripping funnel; 

 an arrangement which admits with facility of any combination of the 

 plates which may be desired. 



April 28, 1836. 



DAVIES GILBERT, Esq., Vice-President, in the Chair. 



Captain John James Chapman, R.A., was elected a Fellow of the 

 Society. 



On certain parts of the Theory of Railways - } with an investigation 

 of the formulae necessary for the determination of the resistances to 

 the motion of carriages upon them, and of the power necessary to 

 work them. By the Rev. Dionysius Lardner, LL.D., F.R.S. 



The author observes, in his prefatory remarks, that an extensive 

 and interesting field of mathematical investigation has been recently 

 opened in the mechanical circumstances relative to the motion of 

 heavy bodies on railways ; and having collected a body of experiments 

 and observations sufficient to form the basis of a theory, he purposes, 



