94 
vibration other than that produced by the tongues of the 
reeds, and also that the wind supply should be perfectly 
steady. 
Note. — My attention having been drawn by Mr. Baxen- 
dell to a paper in the Proceedings of the Boyal Society, April 
12th, 1877, by Professor Mc.Leod and Lieut. Clarke, “ On 
some figures exhibiting the motion of vibrating bodies, &c.,” 
I think it right to state that my apparatus was constructed 
in its present complete form in January, 1872, and exhibited 
to a number of scientific gentlemen in February, 1872 ; and 
further, independently of this fact, that the apparatus of 
Professor Mc.Leod and Lieut. Clarke (so far as is conveyed 
by the description in the above-mentioned paper) does not 
affect the originality of my schema, — J. B. M. 
Ordinary Meeting, February, 19th, 1878. 
E. W. Binney, F.R.S., F.G.S., President, in the Chair. 
“Note on a Method for Determining the Coefficients in 
Chemical Equations,” by James Bottomley, D.Sc. 
When two or more chemical compounds act upon one 
another so as to produce new compounds, provided we know 
the composition of each, the result may be expressed by a 
chemical equation. Sometimes, in drawing out the equation, 
we have some trouble to determine the coefficients to be 
used with the compounds on each side. 
As far as I am aware, the methods used are purely 
tentative. It occurred to me that in cases where the com- 
position of all the products is known, we might apply the 
method of indeterminate coefficients as follows : — Let S be 
the symbol of an element and a 1 &c., the number of atoms 
of that element occurring in the various compounds entering 
into the equation. 
