]813.] 



Royal Society, 



147 



necessary to enter more fully, both into historical and philoso- 

 phical details, than would otherwise be proper in a periodical 

 journal. On that account, it is possible that our table of the 

 constituents of bodies may be delayed till our seventh number. 



V. Organs of Digestion of Birds. 



In our account of Sir Everard Home's paper on this subject, 

 in p. 7'^ of our last number, we have reversed the matter of 

 fact as far as the length of intestine goes. Those birds have 

 the largest intestines whose food is most scanty, and those the 

 shortest intestines whose food is most abundant. 



*** Being desirous of inserting, in this number, the Report of the French 

 Institute, which reachedus very late, •we are compelled to defer, till our 7iext, several 

 Scientific Notices, for some of which we are indebted to a valued Correspondent. 



Article XI. 

 Proeeedings of Philosophical Societies, 



ROYAL SOCIETY. 



The Society met again on the 14th January, after the 

 Christmas holydayS. 



The remainder of Dr. Lambe's paper on arsenic was read. 

 He distilled a mixture of quick lime and oxide of arsenic, and 

 obtained carbonic acid gas, carbonic oxide gas, and some of an 

 inflammable gas which he called nitro-carl^onic oxide. There 

 remained in the retort a compound of lime and arsenic; the lime 

 was mostly in the state of carbonate. On one occasion, probably 

 when iron fiUngs were mixed with the lime and oxide, some 

 metallic arsenic was sublimed. He had employed 1340 grains of 

 white oxid^ of arsenic, and after the experiment could detect 

 only 1040 grains. Hence he inferred, as a conclusion, that a 

 portion of the arsenic had been decomposed, and resolved into 

 carbon, azote, and oxygen. 



It is hardly fair to make remarks upon a paper which one has 

 only heard read, as many circumstances must escape observation 

 which materially aflect the accuracy of the reasoning ; but in 

 this particular instance I hope 1 may be indulged with an obser- 

 vation or two, on account of the extraordinary consequences 

 which Dr. Lambe has drav/n, and which do not appear to be 

 warranted by his experiments, even as he has stated them 

 himself. 



1. Dr. Lambe did not examine his oxide of arsenic. For any 

 thing we know to the contrary, it may have contained carbonic 

 acid, or it may have been mixed with chalk. 



2, Dr. Lambe did not ascertain whether a quantity of arsenic 



k2 



