Page:Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Vol 1.djvu/330

Rh which the third is ascertained by oxymuriatic gas. The sum of the second and third may be determined by ox uriatic gas, and then the ﬁrst absorbed by liquid potash. The ﬁrst and third being thus known, the second may be inferred, though not removed alone.

The nature of the inﬂammable residuum is then learned by com- bustion, due regard being had to its speciﬁc gravity, and to the propor- tion which the carbonic acid formed bears to the oxygen consumed.

A table is given of the products of various gases, from several dif- ferent species of coal; and a second table, of the speciﬁc gravities of these gases, with the quantities of carbonic acid formed from each, and the quantity of oxygen required for their combustion. It is ob- served generally, that in the distillation of all these substances, the gas received at the commencement of the process is the heaviest, that it requires the largest proportion of oxygen, and is ﬁttest for the purpose of illumination.

The author, having received a male wombat alive from one of the islands in Boss’s Straits, had an opportunity of observing its habits in a domesticated state, and of examining the peculiarities of its in- ternal formation after death, pm‘ﬁcularly the mechanism of the bones and muscles of its hind legs, which have not been described either by Geoﬁmy, in his account of its internal form, or by Cuvier, who has described several parts of its internal structure in his Lefons d’Anatomie Comparée. The stomach of the wombat resembles closely that of the beaver, and difers so much from that of the kanguroo, and other animals of the opossum tribe, that it forms an extraordinary peculiarity. An account of the dissection of a female wombat having been received from the late Mr. Bell, Surgeon to the Colony at New South “Wales, Mr. Home has inserted Mr. Bell’s description, with re- marks especially on the state of the uterus, which was double, and impregnated on each side; that on the right side was as large as a pullet’s egg. The as tincae was ﬁlled with a thick gelatinous sub- stance. When a longitudinal incision was made into its cavity, its coats were found lined with the same jelly, in the centre of which was an embryo wrapped up in very ﬁne membranes, that appeared to have no connexion by vessels with either the uterus or the gela- tinous matter.

These facts, says Mr. Home, throw considerable light on the mode of propagation of this very curious tribe of animals. They conﬁrm, in the most satisfactory manner, the observations contained in a former paper on the kanguroo, which required further evidence, as the specimen on which the observations were made had been sent to England preserved in spirits, and the parts had become very indistinct, from being coagulated and long kept.