velled in the scenes put before him by the glamour of science. We find him inquiring if he does well to hunt and fish, or if he ought to live on pulse only, afraid to kill animals, and if there is reason to be afraid to kill even plants lest they should suffer in their sensitiveness? We remember these fancies in our childhood. The unnamed writer On the Diversions of Hunting, Shooting, Fishing, &c.,' considered as compatible with humanity, p. 341, has leapt bravely through the weaknesses of sentiment that keep us from the use of our nature in the direction of those healthy sports. He says, 'It might then perhaps appear that amidst all the variety and eccentricity which the contemplation of a given character presents, the primary disposition, the original nature, and springs of action are extremely few. If this were proved, the seeming inconsistency between many of the actions of an individual must disappear, as it would be unfair to reason from any partial view of his character.'

This seems true, even when character rises high the foundations are left: we stand upon the earth. This by no means shortens the height to which we may see, or diminishes the world in which the mind lives. We must not forget that the universe of matter has an extension beyond all our conceptions, although we must equally remember that the space between the moving spheres contains power if not matter also, and is inconceivably greater than any space occupied by visible or known material. The materialist has been obliged so to extend his ideas of matter that it has grown into mind; the visible universe with all its greatness has become too small for those who have learnt to look on the magnitude of that which is active but invisible.

It will be seen that in the first volume we have certainly

some very varied information mixed with essays on subjects that in our time would seem better suited to a school for the young; but society was consolidating itself. Education was in an earlier stage, and the demands were simpler than now; old ideas had in many cases been forgotten for want of institutions in which to embody them: they lay entombed in books for want of a new body in which to rise; whilst new ones came fresh into the world and began to receive that encouragement for which wise men and philanthropists had waited in vain in former times. On careful consideration it will appear that such essays were required at the time, and their translation into continental languages with their general reception is a guarantee that they showed an advance on the age, notwithstanding what may have previously existed in more recondite volumes.

Dr. Mainwaring.

Dr. Peter Mainwaring is mentioned as one of the first presidents of the Society. He is also called an eminent physician and a magistrate of the town. He presented to the Royal Infirmary a small collection of books and a bookcase, forming the nucleus of the present library (Manchester Historical Recorder). He lived in King Street. He died in the ninety-first year of his age in 1785. (Harrop's Manchester Mercury.)

Dr. George Bell.

When Dr. Charles Bell, a nephew of the famous Sir Charles Bell, M.D. Edin., came in 1847 to reside in Manchester, he supposed Dr. Geo. Bell to be one of the family; but Dr. Geo.came from Dumfriesshire. (See Currie's account în Mem., vol. ii., p. 382.) He died young. He deserves a longer notice.

CHAPTER VII.

THE THREE HENRYS-DR. EASON-THE MASSEYS, ETC.

WE do not know the ethnology of the Henrys, but from the name we may suppose them to be English, and probably Norman English. However, the family is said to have been in Antrim for several generations. The grandfather of our first Manchester Henry, namely Thomas, commanded a company of foot in the time of James II.; and during the disturbed times which in Ireland succeeded the Revolution was shot by an assassin in his own garden. The son, Thomas Henry's father, was an infant, and was taken care of by a neighbouring nobleman and educated in Dublin; afterwards he was brought to Wales. He married the daughter of a clergyman and began a ladies' school at Wrexham, where Thomas was born. The school was subsequently transferred to Manchester. Thomas Henry, who was born on October 26, (Old Style) 1734, was educated at the grammar school of Wrexham after careful instruction from his mother. He was intended for the Church, but the expense was held to be too great considering the number of the family, and he was apprenticed to an apothecary, Mr. Jones, who soon died, and Henry went to another of the same profession at Knutsford. He studied Boerhaave's Chemistry,' and after his apprenticeship went to assist an apothecary at Oxford by

name Malbon. He attended anatomical lectures, refused a partnership which would have demanded seven years of study for full medical practice, and returned to Manchester as an apothecary, practising in the manner usual at the time. This was a little before Dr. Percival's arrival.

The paper read to the Royal College of Physicians on 'An Improved Method of preparing Magnesia Alba' is the first mentioned in the life by his son. It was written purely with scientific interest, and the magnesia as medicine was not prepared for sale until Mr. Henry had been strongly advised, and had received the opinions of Sir John Pringle, Sir Clifton Wintringham, Dr. Warren, and others. This and some other essays were published in a separate volume. Mr. Henry was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, by the interest of Sir John Pringle, Priestley, and Dr. Franklin, and gradually rose into fame, whilst the family wealth was solidly founded. Mr. Henry introduced to the English chemists the works of Lavoisier up to the year 1776, and illustrated them with notes.

He also first observed that a certain amount of carbonic acid in the air is favourable to the growth of plants, and these experiments were received by Priestley with great interest.

His mode of keeping water pure at sea was an improvement on that of Dr. Alston, of Edinburgh. Dr. Alston had proposed the use of lime to prevent putrefaction, and when the water was required he proposed to precipitate the lime with carbonate of magnesia. This certainly unpractical proposal was changed by Henry into passing carbonic acid though the lime-water and precipitating carbonate of lime. This is the origin probably of Clark's process of purifying water, and it is remarkable that such a simple

thing should have gone through so many stages. Clark added lime to water already containing carbonic acid, and this made a precipitate which not only consisted of the lime added but also of the carbonate which was previously in solution, added to a good deal of organic matter on certain occasions. The 'putrefaction of water' at sea was at one time an alarming evil. People did not consider that pure water could not putrefy, they did not separate the idea of water from that of its contents. Henry's plan may still be used with advantage in many places where the wells require attention, although it is always better to seek a fresh supply purified by nature.

Mr. Henry and Dr. Barnes were the first Secretaries of the Society, and in 1807 the former became President, retaining this position during life, or to the year 1816.

He was a man of clear mind, as his papers testify, ready and practical. He read much, had a good knowledge of all the science known at the time, and gave much attention to history. His sympathies were active with his friends and with the struggling public, and he was one of the early members of a society for the abolition of the African slave trade, showing himself a true man and enlightened thinker in his own house and active laboratory, as well as in the public work of the increasing town, and in his aspirations avoiding the narrowness of self by seeking liberty both in this and in other countries.

On June 27, 1781, a letter was read from James Massey, Esq., to Mr. Bew, containing a new and simple method of impregnating water with fixed air, with a drawing of the apparatus, as well as for decomposing lime-water and rendering putrid water sweet.

Probably the non-publication of the paper is to be