422 
Proceedings of Boyal Society of Edinburgh. [july 18 , 
11. On the Chemical Composition of the Water composing 
the Clyde Sea Area. By Adam Dickie. 
About the beginning of this year I was requested by a sub-com- 
mittee of the Government Grant Committee* to determine some of 
the components of a series of samples of sea water, which were to 
he collected during the year at various parts and at different times in 
the Clyde sea area by the observers of the Scottish Marine Station. 
The collections were chiefly made under the immediate direction of 
Dr H. R. Mill. Since January, accordingly, I have been working 
at this, and have completed in all eighty-nine analyses, the results of 
which I now take the liberty of placing before this Society. There 
are various reasons why this paper should consist of little more than 
tables of results, one of which is that, having little or no experience 
in the science of oceanography, it would be presumptuous in me to 
draw conclusions from my results which would no doubt strike any 
one acquainted with that science at once. Another reason is that, 
though acquainted with some of the physical conditions under 
which the samples were taken, such as depth, temperature, place of 
collection, and date, I am quite ignorant of other conditions quite 
as important, if not more so, in my estimation, as, for instance, pre- 
sence or absence of some freshwater stream near place of collection, 
state of tide, rainfall, &c., — all conditions which would no doubt in- 
fluence more or less materially the salinity of the water. 
It is needless for me even to describe the methods of analysis I 
adopted, as, with one exception, I have adhered strictly to the 
methods so fully described by Dr Dittmar in his memoir on the 
“ Challenger ” waters. The exception was in the case of the chlorine, 
in the analysis of which, though using the modification of Volhard’s 
method described in the memoir for my final titration, I employed 
Mohr’s method, in which chromate of potash is used as an indicator 
for the preliminary. 
It was intended at first to determine the chlorine, the sulphuric 
acid, the alkalinity, and the suspended matter, but the latter I only 
completed in some of the first batch of samples. In estimating this 
* The sub-committee consisted of Professor Dittmar, Professor Crum Brown , 
and Mr John Murray. 
