this end. His troops were to have been transported on rafts, constructed of timber cut down in the vicinity and on the banks of the river and sea coast. With a little of his daring we might do the same at this moment, and with much greater facility. There have been various proposals at different times for opening a communication with India by the Euphrates Valley. That which took the most practical shape was elaborated by Lieutenant Campbell, then of the Royal Engineers, in 1843. His proposal and map were in all essential points identical with those more recently proposed by the great engineer, Sir R. Macdonald Stevenson. These and many other subsequent proposals, both French and English, have all now become merged in the company of which Mr. Andrews is Chairman, and Sir John MacNeill, a man wellknown among you, Engineer-in-Chief. I was induced last year to proceed to Constantinople to obtain the Sultan's firman, and make all preliminary arrangements for the proposed line to India; and I afterwards proceeded, accompanied by Sir John MacNeill, C.E., and two assistant engineers, to examine carefully the coast of Asia Minor, where the Taurus touches the sea, in the hope of finding a practicable valley for a future line through that country, and then proceeded to examine the coast for a good harbour. That of Alexandretta did not promise to answer, on account of its mountains, impassable for a railway; and the ancient harbour of Seleucia was also condemned as not affording sufficient depth of water. But on the southern side of the Bay of Antioch, a spot was selected by Sir John MacNeill admirably adapted to form a safe and commodious harbour of refuge. It will be capable of receiving second-rate line-of-battle ships, and will be as good as, or superior to, the harbour of Kingstown. The spot chosen is three miles south of the river Orontes, and six miles east of the old harbour of Seleucia. The harbour is proposed to be formed by running out a breakwater on the south side of the small natural harbour, which is a perfectly safe and secure landing-place for boats, with good holding-ground; so that vessels taking out materials for the construction of the railway could anchor in safety off this landing-place. Stone of the finest quality abounds close to the point where the breakwater will abut on the land, and can be quarried also to any extent in the immediate neighbourhood. It is proposed to construct about 1000 feet of the breakwater in the first instance, and to complete each portion as the work advances, so as to afford shelter and landing wharfs within the first year or eighteen months, which will enable vessels drawing 20 feet of water to lie in safety during the winter months, if required to do so; and within six months from the commencement of the work a landing-place can be formed, and perfect shelter for boats, at an expense of £20,000. The harbour, when completed, will be capable of giving shelter to thirty_or thirty-five vessels. The average depth of water will be from 20 to 40 feet. Our survey of the country and the subsequent trial sections of the engineers, extended from the coast to within sight of the Euphrates, taking in the towns of Antioch and Aleppo. Beyond the latter, all engineering difficulties cease, the country presenting a hard dry level surface (called in Arabic "Ka Jalide,"-flat and hard), most admirably adapted for a railway. And even between the Mediterranean and Aleppo the difficulties are such as would be considered sinall in this country. There will not be a single tunnel, and only two cuttings of any consequence. Two chain bridges over the Orontes will be necessary; but neither do these present any obstacle to the engineering science of the present day. The estimated expense of the whole line is £6,000,000.

It is impossible to over-estimate the political and commercial advantages which England would derive from the opening up of this most fertile country. History proves what a powerful influence has at all times belonged to the possession of the Valley of the Euphrates; and to science, to the geologist, the naturalist, the ethnologist and the archæologist, fresh and most interesting fields of inquiry would be opened by this line of communication with India. The difficulties of dealing with the Arabs have been much exaggerated. They are a singular people, combining the extremes of good and evil in their character. But with good faith on our part, judicious management, and a little foresight, there would be little to apprehend from them. The chief difficulties in dealing satisfactorily with the Arabs would arise from their ignorance, the hostile state of their tribes, and their blood feuds. But I know

from experience, that by moderation, tact, and truthfulness on our part, these may be overcome.

With regard to a telegraphic communication with India by this route, two lines have been proposed; the one along the Red Sea to Kurrachee, the other along the Valley of the Euphrates to the same part. Both would seem to be most desirable, if not necessary. To effect this a submarine cable should be laid down from Kur. rachee to Ras-el-Had, or some other place near the entrance of the Persian Gulf. Thence the proposed respective companies could carry their lines to England, the one by way of Suez, and the other by the Persian Gulf. The Red Sea line, by following Arabia, at a short distance from the coast, would encounter depths varying from 20 to 100 fathoms nearly the whole way to Suez; coral rocks are only occasionally met with, and we should have the advantage of knowing where an accident might occur, and prepare the means in consequence of recovering and repairing the broken pieces of the cable: so that the completion of the line from Ras-el-Had to Suez does not seem to offer any practical difficulty. For the other line, there is a choice of two routes across Asia Minor from Constantinople, as far as Aleppo by one line, and as far as Dyarbekir by the other: no difficulties whatever exist. But beyond these places the Arabs are to be taken into account, but this is only for a limited distance. The line of the railway would ultimately be the preferable one, but for immediate operation the other might be somewhat quicker. The work might therefore be commenced simultaneously at each extremity. A submarine cable could be laid down from Ras-el-Had to Kurnah, and from the latter place to Bagdad, along the bed of the Tigris; and again between Constantinople and Dyarbekir, beginning at several places at once in each part of these lines. The middle part only would be wanting from Dyarbekir to Bagdad, and this might be completed by a line of Tartars; and thus we should very soon be in possession of two lines of electric wires to India. The line of communication with India proposed by the French, would traverse Asia Minor more to the northward than that which I have advocated, so as to come into this line towards the head of the Euphrates. Unlimited funds might, doubtless, accomplish this, but my local knowledge gives me the firm belief that the Taurus can only be passed, without an absolutely ruinous expense, in the direction of Adana and the Orontes. The French have long seen the importance of the Valley of the Euphrates. They seem to know and feel, as the great Oriental scholar Dr. Sprenger has said, "that its possessor holds the key of the Eastern world." It is, in fact, a country far richer and more valuable than Egypt, and England, therefore, has now at her feet the opportunity of acquiring the means of greatly increasing her commerce, of consolidating Turkey, and of securing our Indian territory both from internal and external dangers; and the proposed railway would be the means of repaying to the East, with tenfold interest, that knowledge and those blessings which came to us originally from thence.

On Australian Crania. By Professor J, H. CORBETT.

Professor J. H. Corbett exhibited crania, which had been selected by the late Dr. John A. Corbett, R.N., in the neighbourhood of Port Essington, North Australia, as affording characteristic examples of the heads of the Aborigines of that country, The texture of the cranial and facial bones is strong and compact. The superior maxillary bones exhibit the prognathous tendency in a marked degree. The frontal region may be described as receding, but by no means deficient in height; the temporal regions are much flattened; the perpendicular measurement of head from the margin of the foramen magnum to the vertex is equal with European heads; the anteroposterior measurement of the cranium is somewhat from half to three quarters of an inch greater than that presented by many European skulls. The internal capacity of these crania was found to be exactly the same as that of several European crania of average size, which had been examined; the method adopted for this purpose being that of sealing up the several apertures, and then filling the head with fine sand introduced through the foramen magnum. This mode of examination tends to show, that the Australian crania are capable of lodging an amount of cerebral matter just equal to that of many European skulls, although the form of the brain must be

necessarily modified and moulded in adaptation with the cranial conformation. In these heads, the cerebellar compartment is not in the least degree larger than in European crania.

On the Character, Extent, and Ethnological Value of the Indo-European Element in the Language of Finland, By RICHARD CULL, F.S.A. The author stated that his would differ from the ordinary form in which papers and communications are presented to the Section. The shortness of time allowed for each paper, the difficulty and extent of the inquiry, and the inability of philological papers to arrest the continuous attention of a mixed audience, induced him to describe simply the method of his investigation, to read portions of two chapters of his forthcoming work on the Finn language, to state some consequences which result from the discovery of the great relationship of the Finn language, and to offer a few remarks in conclusion.

The existence of Greek and Latin words in the Finn language was pointed out by Juslenius in 1712; and Palmroth had previously, in 1685, called attention to certain Greek words in the language. Professor Key drew attention to the subject in 1846, in a short notice of the Grammatica Lapponica' by Fiellström, Stockholm, 1738, and the Grammatica Finnica' by Vhael, Abo, 1733, in a paper entitled "The Lapp and Finn tongues not unconnected with the Indo-European Family. By T. Hewitt Key, A.M.*" Mr. Wedgwood has since drawn attention to the subject by pointing out a number of words which he deems to have miscellaneous affinities with many of the Indo-European languagest. Their views, however, are not generally accepted. The base or root of most Finn words is bisyllabic. The syllables commonly begin with a consonant and end with a vowel; some syllables, however, end with a consonant, of which the most common are k, l, m, n, s and t, but n, s and t are the only consonants found at the end of words. A few syllables occur with two final consonants, and some with two initial consonants; but these are in recently imported words of Swedish origin and chiefly Biblical proper names.

The Swedish words which have been incorporated in the Finn language have either naturally, or by artificial means, the peculiarities which characterize Finn words, as in the following examples :

In the Finn orthography ƒ is written by w; b, d and g hard are unknown to the Finn, except under peculiar conditions. The general principles of Swedish orthography obtain in the Finn language.

The above selected examples are sufficient to indicate the nature of the modifications which Swedish words have suffered on their incorporation in the Finn language. The author has collected and classified every Swedish word in the Finn language under three general heads, viz. (a) unchanged, (3) changed, and (y) greatly changed in form. The several means adopted to bring Swedish words to the Finn form were briefly described. The existence of such words as

and others equally like, suggested a careful study of Finn words in relation to those of the Indo-European languages. The result of this comparison was the discovery of a large number of Indo-European roots which appear to have suffered modifications precisely similar to those which the Swedish words have undergone. The following specimens are sufficient to indicate the nature of this discovery :

The long lists of words from which the above selected vocabulary is taken are too numerous and regular to be examples of mere accidental coincidence. They are words, too, that form the basis or groundwork of speech, and not such words as are commonly imported from one language to another by the fortune of war, or by the peaceful intercourse of commerce. Hence it is impossible to escape the conclusion, that the Indo-European element of the Finn language is an essential fundamental element pervading the Finn language; and being so, the Finn language must be grouped as a member of the Indo-European family of languages. This philological result is of ethnological value; for as we are justified in assuming that peoples speaking languages of a common origin have themselves a common origin, we are bound to assume the Finns to be of the same origin as the rest of the Indo-European nations. And all the Finnic tongues, as the Hungarian, the Lapponic, the Esthonian, and those of the isolated tribes in the Russian Empire, as the Karelian, the Cheremissian, the Sirjanian, &c., must with the peoples speaking them be admitted into the Indo-European family of tongues and peoples.

There is no time even to state the consequences of this admission, but the close connexion of the Turanian and Indo-European families of languages by means of the Finnic dialects is too important not to be named.

On China, in more immediate reference to pending Operations in that
Quarter. By Sir JOHN F. DAVIS, Bart., K.C.B., F.R.S.

The paper, after some general remarks on the interest of the subject at the present moment, enters into a running but graphic description of the coast of Canton river, Chusan, Shanghai, &c., showing the facilities which in many places they afford for defence, and for annoying the hostile fleet, but at the same time the facility with which any such annoyance on the part of the Chinese could be overcome. With respect to Canton, Sir John says,-"It seems at once good policy as regards the Cantonese, and mere justice and humanity towards the better-disposed populations towards the north-east, that, if a lesson is to be administered, it should be administered in the right quarter. Topical evils require topical remedies, and if we were once more to leave Canton to itself (as we have done before), the question would again be asked, which was so often asked then, Why did you not address yourselves to those who had offended you, and were prepared to resist you, instead of attacking us?' At Canton, besides, there is nothing at present to lose, for all trade has left it, and all the foreign quarter is in ruins. The complete capture and occupation of the city, and the heights behind, by our troops, with Hong-Kong and its harbour, its barracks and its hospitals, for the base of operations, would at once dispel the delusions of the Cantonese, and supply us with a material guarantee and pledge, as long as it was retained, for all that we have to require from the Pekin Government. These two points seem to comprise within themselves the objects of the expedition, that is to say, satisfaction for the past and security for the future; and as the surest way to the second, the first seems indispensable, viz. the capture and occupation of the provincial city."

On the Physical Characteristics of the Ancient Irish.
By JOHN O'DONOVAN, LL.D.

The author argued at full length to prove that the ancient Irish were a large race of men, warlike and vigorous, from the poet Claudian and the Christian father St. Jerome, the latter of whom describes a Scot from the neighbourhood of Britain, as canem grandem et corpulentum, et qui calcibus magis possit sævire quam dentibus." Passing over many fabulous accounts of the gigantic size of the ancient Irish, he dwelt with particular emphasis upon the description of the stature and personal appearance of the Irish people given by Giraldus Cambrensis in 1183, before they had received any admixture of Saxon or Anglo-Norman blocd. In his Topographia Hiberniæ,' Dist. i. c. 19, Giraldus says that all the animals in Ireland were smaller than those he had seen in other countries, except man, "who alone retained his majesty of stature ;" and in Dist. iii. c. x., where he says that (although the Irish were no adepts in the science of nursing) their children nevertheless grew up by 1857.

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