376 SCIENTIFIC EECORD FOR 188'2. 



both houses of Parliameut, collect and reduce the solar observations 

 commenced by Mr. Meins in India, and report on all items relatingto this 

 subject. They also have inaugurated the present course of lectures on 

 Solar Physics." {Nature, October 20, 1881, xxiv, p. 594.) 



At the annual meeting of the Meteorological Society, London, January 

 18, 1882, the secretary reported the society- in a remarkably nourishing 

 condition : the number of active fellows was 555, the annual receipts 

 £840 (sterling) and expenditure £197 (sterling) ; number of meteoro- 

 logical stations maintained, 83, the observations of M'hich are regularly 

 published in the record. The president for the succeeding year is J. 

 K. Laughton. The society has published instructions to observers and 

 an index to the publications of English meteorological societies. {Saturej 

 XXV, p. 307.) 



Mr. G. J. Symons, president of the Meteorological Society of London 

 in his annual address traced the history of English meteorological 

 societies from 1723 to 1880. The earliest English effort at forming an 

 English meteorological society, or at any rate securing observations 

 made with comparable instruments, recorded upon a uniform system, 

 was made in 1723, by Dr. James Jurin, then secretary to the Ivoyal 

 Society. In a Latin address made that year by i3r. Jurin, lie antici- 

 pated nearly all the conditions which are now considered essential for 

 comparable observations. This appeal did not lead to much being done, 

 and in 1744 another attempt was made by Mr. Koger Pickering, F. Iv. S., 

 who read before the Koyal Society a paper entitled "Scheme of a diary 

 of the weather, together with drafts and descriptions of machines sub- 

 servient thereunto." The Meteorological Society of the Palatinate was 

 established in 1780 under the auspices of the Elector Charles Theodore, 

 who not only gave it the support of his public i)atronage but entered 

 with spirit and ability into its pursuits and furnished it with the means 

 of defraying the expense of instruments of the best construction, which 

 were gratuitously distributed over Europe and even to America. One 

 of the first acts of the association was to write to all the principal uni- 

 versities, scientific academies, and colleges, soliciting their co-operation 

 and offering to present them with all the necessary instruments, ju-operly 

 verified by standards and free of expense. The offer was accepted by 

 thirty societies, and the list of distinguished men who undertook to 

 make the observations shows the importance which was attached to the 

 plan and the zeal with which it was promoted in every part of the con- 

 tinent. In 1823 the first meeting of the Meteorological Society of Lon- 

 don was held, and was attended by Luke Howard, Thomas Foster, Dr. 

 Birbeck, and others. After 1824 the society languished but was never 

 regularly dissolved. Owing to several letters and articles which ap- 

 })eared in Loudon's Magazine of Natural History^ a meeting was held on 

 November 15, 183G, at which the society was revived, W. H. White 

 appointed secretary, and regular meetings resumed. Application was 

 made to the Eoyal Society for permission to compare the instruments 



