The Sun.
London, England, 1855-09-18 00:00:00

THE BRITISH- ASSOCIATION.

GLASGOW, SEPT. 15.
SECTION A.—MATHEMATICAL AND PHYSICAL SCIENCE.
The business in this section consisted in the reading
of papers by
JAMES THOMSON, Esq., "On Certain Curious Motions
observable on the Surface of Wine and other Alcoholic
Liquors."
Sir DAVID BREWSTER, " On the Binocular Vision of
Surfaces on Different Colours."

Professor TYNDALL, F.R.S., "On Experimental De-
monstration of the Polarity of Diamagnetic Bodies."
Captain W. S. JACOB, Astronomer R3yal, Madras,
" On Certain Anomalies presented by the Binary Star,
70 Ophiuchi."
Rear-Admiral Sir JOHN Ross, " On the Aurora Bore-

Colonel SYKES, " On Hail Storms in India from 1851
to 1855 ; " and

Mr. J. JOHNSTON, "On the Detection and Measure-
ment of Atmospheric Electricity by the Photo-barograph
and Thermegraph."
SECTION B.—CHEMIGAL SCIENCE.

The papers read in this section were those of '
Professor 0-. WILSON, "On the Proofs of the Exist-
ence of Haloid Salts in Solution."

The Rev. A. FARRAR, " On the late Eruption of Ve.
suvius."

Dr. ROWNEY, "Oa the Composition of two Mineral
Substances employed as Pigments."
Dr. EDWARDS, of Liverpool, "On a kind of Titan-
iferous Iron which occurs on the western Shore of the
Mersey."
_ _

Mr. T. GRACE CALVERT, "On the Action of Sulphu
retted Hydrogen on Solutions of Salts of Zinc."

SECTION C..---GEOLOGY.

Mr. ROBERT ALLEN read a paper "On the presen
Condition of the Geysers of Iceland."

Mr. EVAN Horiurs read a paper "On the Gold-
bearing Districts of the World ;" and
Professor NICHOL a paper " On the Auriferous Quartz
Districts of Australia," by Mr. J. A. Campbell, of Glas-
gow, formerly of Australia. Mr. Campbell was of
opinion that the gold fields are inexhaustible, and the
finding of gold only in its infancy. Boundless fields lie
still untouched, which will employ the labour of ages
yet to come, and when efficient machinery shall have
been brought to operate upon the rocks, there may be
then gold enough to liquidate the national debt.
Sir R. J. MURCHISON said he had been in communi-
cation with the governor of Australia, and it was un-
doubted that though the population had of late largely
increased the produce of gold had decreased. It was a
virgin country ; the gold lay in great troughs, and the
question was how long it would take to exhaust them.
It might be a quarter of a century—more or less—he
would not like to name it ; but it would be, sooner
or later, exhausted. The riches were on the surface.
When the Spaniards first visited South America, and
found the palace of Montezuma and the other princes
covered with gold, which had been collected by the poor
people with their sticks out of thegravel of the earth, they
said, " What will come when we go down to the bowels
of the earth ;" and it must be remembered that the
Spaniards were then the best miners in the world. What
was the result ? They mined for gold—they were ruined
---and a proverb gradually came into use, which said,
" he who wants to make a fortune will mine for copper;
he who wants a moderate fortune will mine for silver ;
and he who wants to ruin himselflA him mine for gold."
(A laugh.) There might be exceptions to this rule, but
it generally held true. In nineteen cases out of twenty,
deep mining will cost 255. for every 1/. of gold. This
was undoubtedly the case in South America. No doubt,
however, Australia would produce gold for many years,
and enable this country to found there a magnificent
empire. (Applause.)
Mr. PAGE read a paper, in continuation of his remarks
at Liverpool, " On the Subdivisions of the Palmozoic and
Metamorphic Rocks of Scotland ;" and another, " On
the Stratigraphical Relations and Development of the
Freshwater or Lower Carboniferous Limestone of Dr.
Ilibbert."

SECTIONS D. AND E.
These sections did not meet to-day.
SECTION F.—STATISTICS.

Professor WALSH read a paper by J. W. Gilbart, Esq.,
Y.R.S., "On the Laws of the Currency in Scotland."
Mr. NEWMARCH next submitted " An analysis of a
pamphlet by Count Frolich, of some of the principles
which regulate the effects of a Paper Currency."
Dr. CAMPS read a paper by Dr. Guy, " On the Fluc-
tuations in the number of Births, Deaths, and Marriages,
and in the number of Deaths from special causes, in the
Metropolis, during the last 15 years-1840-55."
Dr. COLDSTREAM read a paper "On some of the Re-
sults deducible from the Report on the Statistics of Dis-
ease in Ireland, published along with the Census of
1851."

J. A. CAMPBELL, Esq., Glasgow, read a paper by MY.
Valpy, " On the Effect of the War on the principal Ar-
ticles of Russian Produce." The paper showed that
previous to the war Russia exported her principal pro-
ductions chiefly to England, and England imported such
productions chiefly for Russia ; that since the outbreak
of war the exports of produce from Russia have dimi-
nished to a greater proportionate extent than thelgene-
ral imports of such articles into England ; that the value
of produce in Russia cannot compensate the producer
fur the decrease of exports, whilst supplies from other
countries than Russia will prevent the consumer in Eng-
land suffering from very high prices ; that the difficulties
and consequent expense of transport by land from Rus-
sia render the injuries of a blockade as necessarily very
severe.

The Section adjourned till Monday.
CONVERSAZIONE IN THE CITY HALL.

The chief attraction of Saturday evening was the ex-
hibition of the electric light.
Professor WILSON explained the generation of the
light, and Messrs. Dubosq and Nachet projected the
images of various natural objects upon a white screen:
where they were seen magnified to the extent of 6,000
times.

The experiments concluded with a series of panoramic
views of Paris, of the Paris Exhibition, &c.