471 



rent of the battery is obstructed by causing it to pass through the 

 long wire ofa galvanometer, orthrough the electrolyteof a voltameter, 

 the course of the secondary current from each separate cell is always 

 normal, or in the same direction : when, on the other hand, the 

 battery-current is allowed to flow with the least possible resistance, 

 as by completing the main circuit by a short wire, the secondary 

 current of the separate cells is in the opposite direction. Hence 

 the resistance may be so adjusted as that the secondary current shall 

 altogether disappear, or alternate between the two directions. 



The remainder of the paper is occupied with the detail of ex- 

 periments made with a view to ascertain the effects of different degrees 

 of resistance to the voltaic currents under a great variety of cir- 

 cumstances. 



April 20, 1837. 



The Right Honourable the Earl of BURLINGTON; V.P. in the 



Chair. 



Frederic C. Skey, Esq., was elected a Fellow of the Society. 



A paper was read in part, entitled, " Observations taken on the 

 Western Coast of North America." By the late Mr. Douglas ; 

 with a report on his paper; by Major Edward Sabine, R.A., F.R.S. 

 Communicated by the Right Honourable Lord Glenelg, one of His 

 Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State, F.R.S., &c. 



April 27, 1837. 

 FRANCIS BAILY, Esq., V.P. and Treas., in the Chair. 



M. Antoine Cesar Becquerel, Professor C. G. Ehrenberg, Ad- 

 miral A. J. Von Krusenstern, and the Chevalier C. F. Mirbel, were 

 elected Foreign Members of the Society. 



The reading of Mr. Douglas and Major Sabine's paper, was re- 

 sumed and concluded. 



In the report prefixed to this paper, Major Sabine states, that 

 Mr. Douglas was originally a gardener, and was, in the year 1833, 

 recommended by Sir William Jackson Hooker to the lace Mr. Joseph 

 Sabine, who was then Secretary to the Horticultural Society of Lon- 

 don, as a fit person to be employed by the Society in selecting and 

 bringing to England a collection of plants from the United States 

 of America. Having accomplished this mission to the complete 

 satisfaction of his employers, he was next engaged on an expedition 

 having similar objects with the former, but embracing a much larger 

 field ; namely, the tract of country extending from California to 

 the highest latitude he might find it practicable to attain on the 

 western side of the Rocky Mountains. Anxious to render to geo- 

 graphical and physical science all the services in his power, and to 

 avail himself for that purpose of every opportunity which his 

 visiting these hitherto imperfectly explored regions might afford 

 him, he now endeavoured by diligent application to supply the 

 deficiencies of his previous education. During the three months 



