Royal Astronomical Society. 555 



Amongst the instruments alluded to in the statement of the pro- 

 perty of the Society, " the Council have the satisfaction of bringing 

 before the notice of the members, the valuable joint present, from 

 Sir John Herschel and his aunt Miss Caroline Herschel, of a seven- 

 feet reflecting telescope made by the late Sir William Herschel, and 

 used by her in many of her observations. This token of respect and 

 attention will be duly estimated by the Society, who will doubtless 

 preserve this interesting memorial of science with* more than ordi- 

 nary care. 



" Amongst the losses by death, during the past year, the Council 

 have to regret the decease of Capt. Drummond, Dr. Gregory, Prof. 

 Leybourn, and Mr. Best, on the home list ; and MM. Olbers, Pois- 

 son, and Littrow, on the foreign list. 



" Capt.Thomas Drummond was born atEdinburgh in October 1797, 

 and entered the corps of Royal Engineers in July 1815. In this de- 

 partment his talent for mechanical combinations became conspicu- 

 ous, which, together with his close attention to the study of che- 

 mistry, rendered his services of considerable value. In 1819, he took 

 part in the trigonometrical survey which was then carrying on in 

 Great Britain, under the superintendence of Col. Colby : and whilst 

 in this employment, he suggested the happy idea of applying the 

 brilliant lamp, which goes under his name, to rendering visible the 

 distant stations. An account of this valuable invention is printed 

 in the Philosophical Transactions for 1826*. 



" Capt. Drummond was an early member of this Society, and took 

 great interest in promoting its welfare. During the comparisons of 

 the standard scale of the Society with the parliamentary standard, 

 he frequently attended the meetings of the Committee, and aided 

 them with his opinion and advice on several important points. His 

 previous knowledge and experience on such subjects had been well 

 matured by the laborious and extensive comparisons of the new 

 standard bars, used in the trigonometrical survey, that had just be- 

 fore been carried on at the Tower, principally under his manage- 

 ment ; and where he had alternately to encounter the heat of an 

 oven and the cold of an ice-house : no method being left untried for 

 attaining the greatest degree of accuracy, both in the measures them- 

 selves, and in determining the rate of expansion. 



" It is supposed that the first shock which"Capt. Drummond's con- 

 stitution received, was in laying down the base-line at Loch Foyle, 

 in Ireland ; where he was oftentimes exposed to the inclemencies of 

 the weather, and himself frequently standing in deep water, earnestly 

 intent on the operations that were then carrying on, as a foundation 

 for the future survey of the country. In fact, he entered with so 

 much ardour and zeal into whatever he undertook, that he might 

 be considered the life and soul of every enterprise in which he was 

 engaged. But he was withdrawn from his geodesical pursuits by 

 the Lord Chancellor (Brougham), who placed him at the head of the 

 Boundary Commission that was established as a preliminary to the 



[• See Phil. Mag., First Series, vol. lxvii. p. 373. 453.— Ed.] 

 2 02 



