198 PROGRESS OF ASTRONOMICAL PHOTOGRAPHY. 



tography, or the science of chemistry. ^\\t I cannot admit the justice 

 of this view. What should we now say of tlie early fellows of the Royal 

 Society, if they had relegated Newton, when he invented the telescope 

 that bears his name, to the Company of Spectacle Makers for his meed 

 of praise? What should we now think, had the barren honors which 

 grace scientific discovery been denied to such mechanical inventors 

 as Hadley, or Dollond, or Sir William Herschel, or Lord Rosse, or 

 Lassell? With them the name of De La Rue, I feel, will hold no 

 inferior place. 



The President, then delivering the medal to Mr. De La Rue, ad- 

 dressed him in the following terms: 



Mr. De La Rue: Li compliance with a resolution of the council, I 

 have the pleasing duty of placing in your hands the highest tribute 

 to merit which they have in their power to bestow. The instruments 

 made or improved by you, the important uses to which you have ap- 

 plied them, and the liberality with which you have communicated the 

 results of your discoveries to the public, all indicate, in the opinion 

 of the council, a mind highly cultivated, whose energy has been 

 directed, during many years, to the attainment of scientific perfection. 



But your unceasing efforts and delicate manipulation in reducing 

 the new and wonderful art of photography to astronomical purposes, 

 and in rendering chemistry a handmaid to astronomy, supply the 

 more immediate motive of their approbation. 



May Divine Providence continue to bestow upon you health and 

 intelligence, and every social blessing, enabling you still further to 

 illustrate the glory of the Creator, and to promote the rational enjoy- 

 ment of our fellow-creatures. 



