Chemical and Photographic Section, Dec, 13.— 
Mr. Charles Hill ia the chair. Mr. W. L, Carpenter read a 
: paper on Pharoah's Serpents' eggs, the chemical toy now so 
common, and gave the results of experiments that he had 
made to ascertain the composition of the serpent. As was 
well known, the white powder forming the egg was 
sulphocyanide of mercury, and the author described several 
modes of preparing it. Theoretically represented by the 
formula Hg. Cy. H2, it would contain 63*3 per cent, of mer- 
cury, and the specimen he analysed yielded 64.9 per cent. 
The loss of weight on burning was 19'27 per cents, and as 
1 the product contained 70.5 per cent, of mercury, it followed 
that about one-seventh of tha mercury in the egg was 
i volatilised. He showed an experiment to prove that the 
serpent form was not, as was generally supposed, caused by 
the cone of tinfoil, and described others which led him to 
believe that the blackness of the inside of the serpent was 
due to the mechanical mixture of sulphide of mercury 
with mellon, or melam, products of the decomposition of 
the sulphocyanides which had been studied by Liebig. The 
brown exterior contained no sulphide of mercury, and, 
when treated with nitro-hydrochioric acid, yielded a sola- 
tion in which sulphuretted hydrogen caused a yellow flocu- 
lent precipitate, the nature of which he had not ascertaiued. 
The specific gravity of the serpent was 0.069, water bting 
1*000, and such was the continuity of the skin that no air 
escaped through it when the serpent was sunk in water, Mr. 
Carpenter then exhibited a photograph, sent by Mr. P. J. 
Worsley, showing wMat facilities the paper process gave for 
getting quantity, and also the desirable quality of size, as well 
as the advantages over working with glass plates as re- 
garded portable apparatus. A friend of Mr. Worsley's 
had taken out, on a trip, seventy sheets ready 
prepared by the turpentine waxed paper process, 
and had had no failure among them, although the expo- 
sures varied from five minutes to four hours. Mr. Noble, 
the secretary, exhibited a series of very beautiful paper 
negatives, taken by Mr. West, of the CUfton Observatory, 
of large size, The process was the ordinary iodized paper 
one, the sheets being waxed either before or after exposure, 
Eo preference being given to either. It was generally 
allowed by those present that where long exposure and 
slow development were possible, no process was equal to this 
for the exceeding beauty of detail obtainable by it. 
Zoological Section, Dec, 14.-—Tbe officers of the 
section being absent, and only three members attending, the 
meeting was adjourned until January, 
WM. LANT CARPENTER, 
Hon. Heporiihg Secretary, 
