of which they are composed being arranged with as much regularity as the fibres of the most delicately-formed flower.

As, in evaporation, heat performs an important office, so in the diffusion of vapour through the atmosphere, its accumulation in the form of clouds, its dispersion, reunion, and final precipitation upon the earth, the agency of electricity is no less conspicuous. Our knowledge of the conditions which determine the developement of electricity is necessarily imperfect. A few of these conditions are tolerably distinct; but others are veiled in uncertainty, simply because our post of observation is remote from the scene of their operations.

The variable distances at which clouds float in the air, obviously implies a peculiarity of texture adapted to their respective situations and circumstances. Hence they admit of a classification which enables those who are skilled in this branch of Meteorology to distinguish by their form, colour, and relative distances, the several varieties, and to predict with considerable accuracy what kind of weather is likely to prevail.

THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION.

THE Sixth Meeting of the Association had been last year fixed by the General Committee to be held at Bristol. A variety of considerations influenced the selection of this site from a number of others, whose claims were put forward. The Association had met once in the north of England (at York), twice in the midland counties (at Oxford and Cambridge); it had travelled into Scotland (to Edinburgh); and to hold its last meeting it had gone to Ireland. Thus might it be said to have perambulated every part of the United Kingdom, except the southern part of it: and thus it was that the claims of Bristol, the capital of the south, to the distinction-often and warmly preferred-were, after more of opposition, canvassing, and party feeling, than might have been expected, preferred to those of Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, and Newcastle, all of which great cities had, we believe, their deputations present.

The place of meeting had, moreover, advantages peculiar to itself. The north of Somerset is a county of great geological interest, it connects itself by an interesting chain of geological gradations with the muchdebated carbonaceous district of Devonshire, and its blue Lias quarries are in themselves a fossil museum. And, moreover, as lovers of science are not unfrequently idle men (with respect be it spoken), and lovers of pleasure, to their investigations were offered the magnificent scenery of the northern coast of Devon-Porlock, Linton, Ilfracombe, and Clovelly -names treasured amongst the tenderest recollections of travellers in search of the picturesque. Who, too, had not heard of that delightful excursion of a day, from Wells to Weston, if he had never been fortunate enough to make it—a day's journey which includes within it a visit to the remarkable cavern of Wokey, the cliffs of Cheddar, the bone-cave, more correctly the hyæna-den, of Banwell, and the bay of Weston. Again, northward, there were the Severn and the Wye, offering themselves to the use of the Association, for an excursion to Chepstow and to Tintern ;

and, last, but not least of objects of interest, was Clifton itself, with its vast limestone cliffs, or rather quarries, crowned with terrace upon terrace, and crescent upon crescent, of Bath-stone palaces.

But, to the actual business of the Association. The following is a list of the General Officers, as advertised for the occasion:

Trustees (Permanent)-C. Babbage, Esq., F.R.S.; R. J. Murchison, F.R.S.; John Taylor, Esq., F. R. S.

President, The Most Noble the Marquis of Lansdowne.

Vice-Presidents,-The Most Noble the Marquis of Northampton, F. R.S.; Rev. W. D. Conybeare, F.R.S.; James C. Prichard, M.D., F.R.S. General Secretaries,-Francis Baily, F.R.S.; Rev. William V. Harcourt, F.R.S. Assistant General Secretary,-Professor Phillips, F.R.S.

Treasurer,-John Taylor, F.R.S.

LOCAL OFFICERS.-Treasurer, George Bengough, Esq.

Secretaries, C. Daubeny, M.D., F.R.S.; V. F. Hovenden, Esq.

At each of its meetings, the first step is the assembling of its General Committee, composed of those of its members who have contributed papers to the published transactions of philosophical societies, or who have been appointed deputations from such societies; and this committee met at Bristol, at twelve o'clock on Saturday the 20th, in the Chapter-House of the Cathedral. Among the more distinguished of the members present, we observed Professor Sedgwick, Professor Babbage, Sir David Brewster, Mr. Baily, Mr. Whewell, Sir W. Hamilton, the Provost of Trinity College, Dublin, (Dr. Lloyd,) Dr. Dalton, Professor Moseley, Professor Lloyd, Dr. Daubeny, Dr. Lardner, and Mr. Vernon Harcourt. The chair was taken by Mr. Whewell, the minutes of the proceedings of the committee at its last meeting were read, and the arrangements for its present meeting detailed by the honorary secretary, Mr. Vernon Harcourt, and the assistant secretary, Professor Phillips, the latter referred principally to the officers recommended to be appointed in the different sections, their presidents, vice-presidents, secretaries, and committees: they will be found detailed below.

Macartney.

Secretaries-Dr. Symonds, G. D. Fripp, Captain Chapman

Dr. O'Beirne

Dr. Bernard

Esq.
Committee

S.D.Broughton, Esq.
R. Carmichael, Esq.

Dr. James Bernard Dr. Carson

1

G. Cubitt, Esq.
J. S. Enys, Esq.
Wm. Hawkes, Esq.
E. Hodgkinson, Esq.
Dr. Lardner

Professor Moseley
M. le Playe
Sir John Rennie
Geo. Rennie, Esq.
John Taylor, Esq.
Rev. W. Taylor

The scheme of the proceedings of the Association was to remain as heretofore; as, however, some of our readers may not be acquainted with it, and as some knowledge of it will perhaps assist them in following what we may have hereafter to say, we shall here, in a few words, describe it.

The subjects, the discussion of which is considered as properly belonging to the province of this Association, are embraced under seven distinct heads, and the members attaching themselves to the discussion of them, are supposed to divide themselves into seven distinct sections, which are, in their collective capacity, the Association; and which are distinguished from one another, and designated by seven successive letters of the alphabet.

To each of these sections are assigned officers-a president, vicepresidents, secretaries, a committee, and a place of meeting. At Bristol,

section A met in the Merchants' Hall; section B, at the Grammarschool; section C, at the Institution; sections D and E, at Colston's School; section F; at Harril's Rooms; and section G, at the Merchants' Hall.

The committee of each section assembles at half past ten o'clock in the morning, and the section itself at eleven o'clock.

It is to the Committee of the Section that any paper intended to be discussed in it, is first submitted, and being approved of there, it is announced on the day of meeting, with the other subjects of discussion, in the order in which it will be taken. The business of each section occupies it from eleven to two or three o'clock, when it separates. For the evenings of four alternate days of the week, meetings of the Association are fixed, not, as in the mornings, in sections, but collectively, in some place sufficiently large to contain the whole body; and the ladies who may be disposed to honour the deliberations of the Association with their presence, of whom each member is allowed to introduce one. At this evening-meeting the President of the Association presides, and the other officers and more distinguished members of it are collected round him; and among the rest the presidents of the several sections. These each in his turn then reports to the meeting the proceedings of his section during that and the preceding day, stating concisely the results of the discussions which had been induced, and the more remarkable of the facts elicited; thus, although the attention of each member during the day-time, is of necessity limited to the deliberations of the particular section to which he attaches himself, yet in the evening he is enabled to obtain, at least, some general notion of what has been doing in other sections of the Association.

The reading of these reports of the presidents of sections is followed, on the first evening of meeting, by a general report of the secretary for the year, of the progress of Science during that year-a report usually of great interest and importance, directing the attention of the members to the more recent researches of learned men, and keeping the Association, as it were, continually on a level with the onward progress of Science. On the other evenings of meeting, the reports of the presidents are followed by some lecture from one of the more eloquent of the members appointed by the Council for that purpose; or some discussion, on a subject of interest and importance, among the most distinguished persons present.

Such was the scheme of the proceedings of the Association at its previous meetings, and such was the plan now to be adopted. The places of sectional meetings have been mentioned; the place appointed for the general meetings was the Theatre, of which the president, officers, and general committee of the Association were to occupy the stage, and the other members the pit, gallery, and boxes. The president appointed for the year was the Marquis of Lansdowne; on the morning of Saturday however, a letter was, received from the noble Marquis, announcing that he was prevented from coming to Bristol, by the alarming illness of his eldest son, the Earl of Kerry; and an express was immediately sent off to solicit of the Marquis of Northampton, who had announced his intention of being present, that he would relieve the Association from its present embarrassment, and take upon himself the office of president. The business of the general committee possessed little interest, except in

the announcement of this fact, the declaration of the officers and committees for the year, of the places of sectional and general meeting, of the place (no unimportant matter) of dining, and of a promenade at the Zoological Gardens and on the evenings at Miller's Nursery-Ground, when there was no general meeting in the Theatre,

There was read the treasurer's report, from which it appeared that the property of the Association, including the estimated value of a number of copies of the printed transactions, was 45641. A committee of recommendations, which had been appointed from time to time, was reappointed: a somewhat unintelligible motion, that the Council should meet during the week, and exercise its proper functions in the constitution of the Association, which it appears had remained in abeyance, was carried, and the General Committee broke up.

The first business of the Association having thus been completed, we went forth from the ancient Chapter-house appointed for its sittings, and found ourselves in a shower of rain: the day was most unpropitious, —it rained in torrents until the evening. Nevertheless, the streets presented the manifest evidence of a new and strange excitement; they were full of passengers, of whom every fourth or fifth might be distinguished to be a philosopher, by the manifest impatience of his motions and frequent and feverish inquiries for some part or another of the great city, where he was to take up his abode. Of all such inquiries, however, the most frequently reiterated was, no doubt, the inquiry for the Inquiryroom, such being the attractive designation assigned for the time to certain auction-rooms in Corn-street, called Harril's Rooms. We ourselves followed the stream to these Inquiry-rooms, rejoicing in the hope of a complete and comprehensive solution of all the difficulties which in the multiplicity and complexity of such manifold plans and arrangements we felt ourselves oppressed with. To our dismay, on arriving at the room of Mr. Harril, we found it swept and garnished; and instead of the smooth and facile suavity, the "frons urbana" of a man, on whom had devolved the responsible but unenviable functions of an answerer of inquiries, we encountered a very abrupt and somewhat ill-mannered person, from whom it was with difficulty that we could learn so much as this, that our steps must be retraced to the Grammar-school, where our inquiries might be repeated. Although thus disappointed, we were yet secretly, and in the pride of our humble philosophy, gratified by this other realization of a principle which we have held from our very school-days, founded, as we believe, in the very nucleus of human nature, and common to all times and ages of men, but generally cited in those words of Horace, "Lucus a non lucendo;" a principle, according to which the true designation of a thing is to be taken as the very opposite of that which is assigned to it. Thus convinced that these rooms were called Inquiry-rooms, because inquiries were not answered there, we found, as we best could, our way to the Grammar-school. Here we received a programme, of which the following is a copy, and renewed our ticket according to the prescribed forms.

PROGRAMME.

At the Inquiry Room, in Harril's Rooms, Corn Street, which will be open on and after Saturday, the 20th of August, to Members, and Persons who are desirous of