Such is a concise view of the system at first laid down by the wisdom of our founders, and which, with some modifications, has produced the inestimable contents of our printed volumes. In practice the "suggestive Report" is often a paper contributed by some able investigator to some meeting of the Association, which produces a request from the body that he will pursue his researches with their sanction and assistance, and write a Report complementary to his own suggestions.

Again, although we did not profess to receive and publish individual researches, the number of these received at each meeting is very great; the merit of some of them so eminent, that they are authorized to be printed entire amongst the Reports; and the Notices and Abstracts of the remainder, which at first occupied a small proportional part of each volume, now occupy nearly half of it.

I will now direct your attention to the principal objects to which our funds have been directed.

To appreciate the value of an investigation by the money it costs, may appear at first sight a most unworthy test, although it be a thoroughly British view of the subject.

But there are undoubtedly a great number of most important inquiries in science that are arrested, not for want of men of zeal and ability to carry them out, but because from their nature they require an outlay of money beyond the reach of the labourers who ardently desire to give their time and thoughts to them, and because the necessity and value of the proposed investigation are wholly unappreciable by that portion of society who hold the purse-strings.

But it is in the cases above alluded to of expensive investigation that the direct use and service of our body has been made the most manifest. The British Association holds its own purse-strings, and can also perfectly understand when they should be relaxed. Nay, more, by its influence and character, established by the disinterested labours and successful exertions of more than thirty years, it may be said to command the national funds; for the objects in aid of which Government assistance has been requested, have been so judiciously chosen, that such applications have very rarely been unsuccessful, but have been, on the contrary, most cordially acceded to.

Indeed it may be observed, that from the period of the foundation of the Association the Government of this country has been extending its patronage of Science and the Arts. We may agree with the assertion of our founder, Sir David Brewster, in supposing that this change was mainly effected by the interference of this Association and by the writings and personal exertions of its members.

For the above reasons it appears to me that by a concise review of the principal objects to which the funds of our body have been applied, and of those which its influence with the Government has forwarded, we obtain a measure of the most important services of the British Association.

But in considering the investigations carried out by committees or individual members by the help of the funds of the Association, it must always be remembered that their labours, their time and thoughts, are all given gratuitously.

One of the most valuable gifts to Science that has proceeded from our Association is the series of its printed Reports, now extended to thirty volumes. Yet these must not be supposed to contain the complete record even of the labours undertaken at the request and at the expense of the body. Many of these have been printed in the volumes of other societies, or in a separate form. Several, unhappily, remain in manuscript, excluded from the public by the great expense of publication.

I am the more induced to direct attention to this great work at present because I hold in my hand the first printed sheets of a general Index to the series from 1831 to 1860, by which the titles and authors of the innumerable Memoirs upon every possible scientific subject, which are so profusely but promiscuously scattered through its eighteen thousand pages, are reduced to order, and reference to them rendered easy. This assistance is the more necessary because so many investigations have been continued with intermissions through many years, and the labour of tracing any given one of them from its origin to its termination through the series of volumes is extremely perplexing.

For this invaluable key to the recorded labours of the Association we are indebted to Professor Phillips, and the prospect of its speedy publication may be hailed as a great subject of congratulation to every member of our body. In every annual volume there is a table of the sums which have been paid from the beginning on account of grants for scientific purposes. The amount of these sums has now reached £20,000; and an analysis of the objects to which this expenditure is directed will show that if we divide this into eighteen parts, it will appear, speaking roughly, that the Section of Mathematics and Physics has received twelve of these parts, namely two-thirds of the whole sum, the Sections of Geology and Mechanical Science two parts each, while one part has been given to the Section of Botany and Zoology, and one divided among the Sections of Chemistry, Geography, and Statistics.

The greater share assigned to the first Section is sufficiently accounted for by the number and nature of the subjects included in it, which require innumerable and expensive instruments of research, observatories, and expeditions to all parts of the globe.

If we examine the principal subjects of expenditure, we find, in the first place, that more than £1800 was expended upon the three Catalogues of Stars, namely, the noble Star Catalogue, which bears the name of the British Association, commenced in 1837, and completed in eight years, and the Star Catalogues from the observations of Lalande and Lacaille, commenced in 1835 and 1838, and reduced at the expense of the British Association, but printed at the expense of Her Majesty's Government. £150 was applied principally to the determination of the Constant of Lunar Nutation, under the direction of Dr. Robinson, in 1857, and to several other minor Astronomical objects.

At the very first Meeting at York, the perfection of Tide Tables, Hourly Meteorological Observations, the Temperature of the atmosphere at increasing heights, of Springs at different depths, and observations on the Intensity of Terrestrial Magnetism, were suggested as objects to which the nascent organization of the Association might be directed.

Its steady perseverance, increasing power and influence as successive years rolled on, is marked by the gradual carrying out of these observations, so as to embrace nearly the whole surface of the globe.

Thus, under the direction of Dr. Whewell, a laborious system of observations, obtained by the influence and reduced at the expense of the Association, who aided this work with a sum of about £1300, has determined the course of the Tide-wave in regard to the coasts of Europe, of the Atlantic coast of the United States, of New Zealand, and of the east coast of Australia. Much additional information has been since collected by the Admiralty through various surveying expeditions; but it appears that much is still wanting to complete our knowledge of the subject, which can only be obtained by a vessel specially employed for the purpose.

More than £2000 have been allotted to Meteorology and Magnetism, for the construction of instruments, and the carrying out of series of observations

and surveys in connexion with them. To this must be added a sum of between £5000 and £6000 for the maintenance of Kew Observatory, of which more anon. The advance made in these important sciences, through the labours of the Committees of the British Association, may be counted among the principal benefits it has conferred.

To the British Association is due, and to the suggestion of General Sabine, the first survey ever made for the express purpose of determining the positions and values of the three Isomagnetic Lines corresponding to a particular epoch over the whole face of a country or state.

This was the Magnetic Survey of the British Islands, executed from 1834 to 1838, by a Committee of its members, General Sabine, Prof. Phillips, Sir J. Ross, Mr. Fox, and Mr. Lloyd, acting upon a suggestion brought before the Cambridge Meeting in 1833. It was published partly in the volume for 1838, and partly in the Philosophical Transactions for 1849. This was followed by a recommendation from the Association to Her Majesty's Government, for the equipment of a naval expedition to make a magnetic survey in the southern portions of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. This recommendation, concurred in by the Royal Society, gave rise to the voyage of Sir James Clark Ross in the years 1839 to 1843. In a similar manner was suggested and promoted the magnetic survey of the British possessions in North America, authorized by the Treasury in 1841; the completion of the magnetic survey of Sir James Ross, by Lieutenant Moore and Lieutenant Clark in 1845, in a vessel hired by the Admiralty; the magnetic survey of the Indian Seas, by Captain Elliot, in 1849, at the expense of the Directors of the East India' Company; and the magnetic survey of British India, commenced by Captain Elliot in 1852, and completed between 1855 and 1858 by Messrs. Schlagintweit. Finally, in 1857 the British Association requested the same gentlemen who had made the survey of the British Islands in 1837, to repeat it, with a view to the investigation of the secular changes of the magnetic lines. This has been accomplished, and its results are printed in the new volume for 1861*. The Association also, aided by the Royal Society, effected the organization in 1840 of the system of simultaneous Magnetical and Meteorological Observatories, established as well by our own Government as by the principal foreign Governments at different points of the earth's surface, which have proved so eminently successful, and have produced results fully equalling in importance and value, as real accessions to our knowledge, any anticipations that could have been formed at the commencement of the inquiry.

General Sabine, whose labours have so largely contributed to these investigations, has given to the University an admirable exposition of the results during the present year, in the capacity of Sir Robert Rede's Lecturer.

In 1854, in consequence of representations originating with the British Association, our Government created a special department, in connexion with the Board of Trade, under Admiral FitzRoy, for obtaining Hydrographical and Meteorological observations at sea, after the manner of those which had been for some years before collected by the American Government at the instance and under the direction of Lieut. Maury.

Observations on the wind have been carried on by means of the various self-registering Anemometers of Dr. Whewell, Mr. Osler, Dr. Robinson, and Mr. Beckley, which instruments have been improved, tested, and thoroughly brought into practice by the fostering care of our body; and by the aid of its funds, experiments have been made on the subterranean temperature of deep mines; and on the temperature and other properties of the Atmosphere * Vide volume for 1859, p. xxxvii. + Report, 1858, p. 298.

at great heights by means of Balloon Ascents. Four of these were made in 1852, in which heights between nineteen and twenty thousand feet were reached. But in the present year Mr. Glaisher has attained an altitude of nearly thirty thousand feet. We may hope that some account of this daring achievement, and its results to science, may be laid before the Association at its present Meeting.

Earthquake shocks were registered in Scotland by a Committee of the Association, from 1841 to 1844; and Mr. Mallet commenced, in 1847, a most valuable series of Reports on the Facts and Theory of Earthquake Phenomena from the earliest records to our own time, which have graced our volumes even to the one last published.

One of the most remarkable and fruitful events in our history, in relation to Physical observations, is the grant by Her Majesty, in 1842, of the Observatory erected at Kew by King George the Third, which had been long standing useless. It gave to the Society a fixed position, a depository for instruments, papers, and other property, when not employed in scientific inquiry, and a place where Members of the Association might prosecute various researches. This establishment has been, during the twenty years of its existence, gradually moulded into its present condition of a most valuable and unique establishment for the advancement of the Physical Sciences.

After the first few years its existence was seriously perilled, for in 1845 the expediency of discontinuing this Observatory began to be entertained; but upon examination, it then appeared that the services to science already rendered by this establishment, and the facilities it afforded to Members of the Association for their inquiries, were so great as to make it most desirable to maintain it. Again, in 1848, the burthen of continuing this Observatory in a creditable state of efficiency pressed so heavily upon the funds of the Association, then in a declining state, that the Council actually recommended its discontinuance from the earliest practical period. This resolution was happily arrested.

In 1850 the Kew Committee reported that the Observatory had given to science self-recording instruments for electrical, magnetical, and meteorological phenomena, already of great value, and certainly capable of great further improvement; and that if merely maintained as an Experimental Observatory, devoted to open out new physical inquiries and to make trial of new modes of research, but only in a few selected cases to preserve continuous records of passing phenomena, a moderate annual grant from the funds of the Association would be sufficient for this most valuable establishment for the advancement of the Physical Sciences.

In this year it fortunately happened that Lord J. Russell granted to the Royal Society the annual sum of £1000 for promoting scientific objects, out of which the Society allotted £100 for new instruments to be tried at Kew, -the first of a series of liberal grants which have not only very greatly contributed to the increasing efficiency of the establishment, but have ensured its continuance. It now contains a workshop fitted with complete tools, and a lathe and planing machine, &c. by which apparatus can be constructed and repaired, and a dividing engine for graduating standard thermometers, all presented by the Royal Society. The work done, besides the maintenance of a complete set of self-recording magnetographs, established in 1857, at the expense of £250, by the Royal Society, consists in the construction and verification of new apparatus and in the verification of magnetic, meteorological and other instruments, sent for that purpose by the makers. For example, all the barometers, thermometers, and hydrometers required by the

Board of Trade and Admiralty are tested, standard thermometers are graduated, magnetic instruments are constructed, and their constants determined for foreign and colonial observatories, and sextants are also verified.

An example of its peculiar functions is given in the very last Report (1861), where it appears that an instrument contrived by Professor William Thomson, of Glasgow, for the photographic registration of the electric state of the atmosphere, has been constructed by Mr. Beckley in the workshop of this Observatory, with mechanical arrangements devised by himself, and that it has been in constant and successful operation for some time. Those who have experienced the difficulty of procuring the actual construction of apparatus of this kind devised by themselves, and the still greater difficulty of conveniently carrying out the improvements and alterations required to perfect it when brought into use, will agree that the scientific importance and utility of an establishment cannot be overrated, in which under one roof are assembled highly skilled persons not only capable of making and setting to work all kinds of instruments for philosophical research, but also of gradually altering and improving them, as experience may dictate.

The creation of this peculiar Observatory must be regarded as one of the triumphs of the British Association.

As far as the Association is concerned, its maintenance has absorbed between five and six thousand pounds, the annual sum allotted to it from our funds having for each of the last six years reached the amount of £500.

The construction of the Photoheliograph may be also quoted as an example of the facilities given by this establishment for the developing and perfecting of new instruments of observation.

A suggestion of Sir John Herschel in 1854, that daily photographs of the sun should be made, has given birth to this remarkable instrument, which at first bore the name of the Solar Photographic Telescope, but is now known as the Kew Photoheliograph. It was first constructed under the direction

of Mr. De la Rue by Mr. Ross. The British Association aided in carrying out this work by assigning the dome of the Kew Observatory to the instrument, and by its completion in 1857 in their workshops by Mr. Beckley the assistant; but the expense of its construction was supplied by Mr. Oliveira, amounting to £180. This instrument was conveyed to Spain under the care of Mr. De la Rue on occasion of the eclipse in 1860, who most successfully accomplished the proposed object by its means, and it was replaced at Kew on his return. But to carry on the daily observations for which it was constructed requires the maintenance of an assistant, for which the funds of the Association are inadequate, although it has already supplied more than £200 for that purpose. Mr. De la Rue, in consequence of the presence of the Heliograph at Kew being found to interfere with the ordinary work of the establishment, has kindly and generously consented to take charge for the present of the instrument and of the observations, at his own Observatory, where celestial photography is carried on. But it is obvious that the continuation of these observations for a series of years, which is necessary for obtaining the desired results, cannot be hoped for unless funds are provided.

I cannot conclude this sketch of the objects in the Physical Section to which the funds of the Association have been principally devoted, without alluding to Mr. Scott Russell's valuable experimental investigations on the motion and nature of waves, aided by £274.

If we now turn to Geology we find £2600 expended, of which £1500 were employed in the completion of the Fossil Ichthyology of Agassiz, and upon