L 
The thermometer was fo low as 16° at 
nine o’clock in the morning on the 26th 
of January ; andon the 23d of the fame 
month it had been up at 50°. On sith 
February it was at 17° 5 at nine in the 
-morning the next day at 259; and during 
the remainder of the month never was be- 
low 34° at the fame hour, but was more 
than once above 50°. On26th March, 
at 2h. it was at 68°; and ‘at eighteen 
hours after was 20% lower. In May the 
weather was very fimilar to that lalt year, 
and has produced the fame effeéts with us. 
The higheft that the thermometer has 
been here this fummer is 86°, which was 
en the 2d inftant, at 3h. p.m. the wind 
being fouth ; and although we have re- 
ceived a larger poriion of rain during the 
lafi month than ufual, yet lying in a vale, 
nearly furrounded by hills or higher land 
at a d:ftance of from three to eight miles, 
we have witnefled the lofs of many a 
fhower that hes wafhed their fummits ; 
and I do not doubt but had there been a 
rain guage on the fummit of the Chalk- 
hill, we thould have found a fall of more 
than fix inches of rain forthe month. 
With THE SociETY FOR SCIENTIFIC 
INFORMATION, as propofed in your laft, 
by Howdenienfis, page 531, I am very 
much pleafed. It appears to me very 
practicable ; at any rate it is very defir- 
able. The importance of fuch a fociety 
to the public and every {cientific perfon, 
is too great to fuffer the hint to go by ne- 
gleéted. 
I hope fome of your Correfpondents, 
who are much better qualified than myfelf, 
would take it to confideration, and give 
us, through the medium of your Maga-_ 
zine, a fketch of the d: ficulties of forming, 
and advantages moft likely to arife from, 
a weil-regulated fociety of this kind. To 
me the advantages appear confiderably to 
preponderate. 
I believe fucha fociety, if confined to 
the United Kingdoms, might be eftablith- 
ed in about fix months, and at the very 
trifling expence of five fhillings per mem- 
ber, and might be kept up afterwards at 
a general two fhillings and fixpence fub- 
{cription. This I mean as exclufive of 
the expence of poftage of letters, which 
ought always to be paid by the perfon who 
fiyft folicits the information. 
Suppofe on the average one perfon may 
be found willing to unite in fuch a fociety _ 
et the didance of about fourteen miles, or 
that each peifon might have a diltr:t of 
two hundreé {quare. miles, ‘there would 
then be about 638; to which might be 
added, for Londcn and fome of the molt 
Frenth Subjtitute for Oil Paint. — 
[Aug. }, 
populous places, fixty-two, making in 
the whole feven hundred ; to which, or 
any more propernumber, it might be li- 
mited. ; 
Suppole fomething like the outlines of 
fuch a fociety were publifhed in your Ma- 
gazine for September, and alfo in molt of 
the refpectable periodical publications of 
the day, and that all who might be defi- 
rous of becoming members, might fignify 
it, free of expence, to a committee, who. 
might, in the mean time, be chofen by 
the favourers of the plan in London.— 
Suppofe that each perfon, befides his ad- 
drefs, might fignify to which parts of {ci- 
ence he (or fhe, for I fee no objettion to 
ladies) was moft attached. Thefe names, 
at the commencement of the fociety, might 
be printed in the Monthly Magazine and 
other books of general circulation ; but 
when a fifficient number of names were 
procured, they might be printed, with the 
rules of the fociety, and cne copy fent to 
each member, and charged fufficient to 
pay his proportionate fhare of the general 
expences ; from which time every mem- 
ber would be in poffeffion of the means 
of obtaining general information from 
any quarter. 
Tf \thefe crude hivts do but excite any _ 
of your Corre!pondects to follow the mat- 
ter as its importance deferves, I fhall 
have thus far obiained my end, 
Iam, Sir, yours, &c. 
: RK. BEVAN. 
Leighton, Bedfordftire, 
12th Fuly, 1803: 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SiR, 
N your laft Number I find fome obfer- 
vations, by a perfon who figns J. C. 
ov the failure of a propofed fubititute for 
oil-paint, firft made known by Citizen de 
Vaux. As wellioreicue Citizen de Vaux’s 
invention from the charge of incompe- 
tency to its propofed purpofe, thus pre!er- 
red againit it by J.C. as to furnifh him 
with my experience of its utility, I defire 
to ftate the following particulars. 
I frit met with the Memoir of M. de 
Vaux in the Repertory of Arts about 
twoyears ago, as nearly as T can recollect 5 
and in an extract which I at that time 
made from it, 1 find the proportions of the 
articles compofing it, and the direétions 
for ufing it, to be as follows: 
Take of fkimmed milk, 1 pint, | 
Frefh flaked lime, - 6 ounces, 
Spanifh white, - § pounds, 
‘Linteed-oil, 2 4 ounces, 
Put 
