471 



such as are harmless in themselves ; and hence the liquid of 

 Ledoyen I do not think adapted for this particular pur- 

 pose. For the preservation of moist anatomical specimens 

 it answers very well, but not for dried ones. 



A discussion ensued, in which Messrs. Hardy and 

 Morton took part. 



At the close of the meeting about twenty gentlemen, 

 Members of the Society, retired to the Council-room, where 

 ample preparations had been made in order to test the 

 deodorizing powers of the several fluids referred to in the 

 paper. Their relative efficacy^ however, was the chief object 

 aimed at, as being at once the most important to the public, 

 and that upon which a decision thus deliberately expressed 

 by the largest and most influential of the scientific societies 

 of Yorkshire, might reasonably be expected to carry great 

 weight with commissioners and parochial authorities, in the 

 settlement of a question much agitated out of doors by rival 

 claimants. 



The materials operated upon consisted of given quantities 

 of night-soil, fragments of horse flesh, and blood, in an 

 advanced state of decomposition, which, together with a 

 pail of lime from the gas works, charged with carburetted 

 hydrogen and the bi-sulphuret of carbon, emitted odours 

 which it is needless to describe. In instituting these ex- 

 periments, the author of the paper regretted the absence, 

 from indisposition, of his friend Mr. West, F.R.S., of 

 Leeds, and of Mr. Denton, chemist, who had engaged to 

 assist him in the necessary manipulation ; whilst a third 

 gentleman from Halifax, who had kindly tendered his ser- 

 vices, was placed hors de combat from the stench. The 

 experiments were conducted seriatim, when the opinion of 

 the society was sought and expressed in each instance as 

 they proceeded. For the present it will suffice to state 

 that each and all the fluids in their turn mitigated the 



