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Royal Irish Academy. 
1865 lie was made a Fellow of llio Iloyal Society, and lias served on 
several Royal Commissions, such as those appointed to inquire into the 
lledical Acts, into the Prisons in Ireland, and on the Education and 
Employment of the Blind. 
"Well known and highly respected hy his professional colleagues, 
he was President of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland in 1877 ; 
and was President of the Academy of Medicine in Ireland in 1885. 
During the Crimean War he served as a Yolunteer, being first 
attached to the British Hospital at Smyrna, and then at Sebastopol, 
receiving for his services the British Medal and clasps and the 
Turkish Medal. 
His contributions to Surgical literature were very numerous, but 
in his early days, before the responsibilities and cares of a large 
practice were upon him, he devoted all his leisure to Physiological and 
Biological studies : many papers on such subjects Avill be found in the 
Journal de la Fhysiologie^ and in the Froceedings of the Royal Dublin 
Society. To our Transactions he contributed in 1862 a Memoir on the 
Lateral Line in Eishes." 
Sir Robert Kane, almost from his boyhood, exhibited a very strong 
taste and aptitude for chemical research, and in 1828, at the early age 
of eighteen, published his first paper, " Observations on the Existence 
of Chlorine in the ]N"ative Peroxide of Manganese." This was soon 
followed by a number of essays on various chemical subjects. Eor his 
investigations into the chemical history of Archil and Litmus, printed 
in the Philosophical Transactions, he obtained in 1841 a Royal Medal 
from the Royal Society of London. 
Eor his researches on the nature and constitution of the compounds 
of Ammonia he was awarded, in 1843, the Cunningham Gold Medal of 
this Academy. It may be mentioned in connection with his labours 
on those compounds, that in the opinion of Berzelius, Kane has assisted 
in an important degree, to establish the actual existence in nature of 
■amide (or, as Kane preferred to call it, amidogene, from its analogy with 
oxygen, &c.), i.e. HsJN", which had been before only inferred by Dumas. 
In addition to these classical researches, he made many others of 
considerable scientific value, amongst which may be mentioned those 
on Pyroxylic spirit, or Acetone ; on the composition of certain essential 
oils ; on the constitution of the Ethers ; and on several new Salts, or 
