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XXXII. Instructions fur the Scientific Expeditio7i to the A?it- 

 arctic Regions, prepared hy the President and Council of 

 the Royal Society*. 



PHYSICS AND METEOROLOGY. 



THE Council of the Royal Society are very strongly impressed 

 with the number and importance of the desiderata in physical and 

 meteorological science, which may wholly or in part be supplied by 

 observations made under such highly favourable and encouraging cir- 

 cumstances as those afforded by the liberality of Her Majesty's Go- 

 vernment on this occasion. While they wish therefore to omit no- 

 thuig in their enumeration of those objects which appear to them 

 deserving of attentive inquiry on sound scientific grounds, and from 

 which consequences may be drawn of real importance, either for the 

 settlement of disputed questions, or for the advancement of knowledge 

 in any of its branches, — they deem it equally their duty to omit or pass 

 lightly over several points which, although not without a certain de- 

 gree of interest, may yet be regarded in the present state of science 

 rather as matters of abstract curiosity than as affording data for strict 

 reasoning ; as well as others, which may be equally well or better 

 elucidated by inquiries instituted at home and at leisure. 



1. Terrestrial Magnetism. 



The subject of most importance, beyond all question, to which the 

 attention of Captain James Clark Ross and his officers can be turned, 

 — and that which must be considered as, in an emphatic manner, the 

 great scientific object of the Expedition, — is that of Terrestrial Mag- 

 netism ; and this will be considered : 1st, as regards those accessions 

 to our knowledge which may be supplied by observations to be made 

 during the progress of the Expedition, independently of any concert 

 with or co-operation of other observers ; and 2ndly, as regards those 

 which depend on and require such concert ; and are therefore to be 

 considered with reference to the observations about to be carried on 

 simultaneously in the fixed magnetic observatories, ordered to be 

 established by Her INIajesty's Government with this especial view, 

 and in the other similar observatories, both public and private, in 

 Europe, India, and elsewhere, with which it is intended to open and 

 maintain a correspondence. 



Now it may be observed, that these tjvo classes of observations 

 naturally refer themselves to two chief branches into which the 

 science of terrestrial magnetism in its present state subdivides itself, 

 and which bear a certain analogy to the theories of the elliptic move- 

 ments of the planets, and of their periodical and secular perturba- 



* The President and Council having been informed by the Lords Commissioners 

 of the Admiralty that it had been determined, in conformity with their recom- 

 mendation, to send out Captain James C. Ross on an Antarctic Expedition for 

 scientific objects, and having been requested to communicate any suggestions upon 

 subjects to which they might wish his attention to be called, referred the consi- 

 deration of each to distinct Committees, namely, those of Physics, Meteorology, 

 Geology, Botany, and Zoology, the result of whose labours is the Report from which 

 the above is an extract. — Ed. 



Phil. Mag, S. 3. Vol. 15. No. 95. Sept. 1839. N 



