4 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
EARLY REPRESENTATIONS, AND COMMENCEMENT MADE. 
The importance of publishing tide tables for Canadian waters and 
the necessity for tidal observations was discussed as early as 1884. 
The question was taken up at a meeting of the British Association 
held in Montreal in that year; and the Montreal Board of Trade were 
also considering the matter independently. Ship owners and masters 
of vessels were practically unanimous as to the pressing need for 
knowledge on the subject of tides and currents; and they united with 
other bodies in addressing a strong memorial on the subject to the 
Dominion Government. During the re-survey of the St. Lawrence, 
in 1887 and 1888, the matter received some attention. Various repre- 
sentations were made and petitions addressed to the Minister of Marine 
and Fisheries until 1889, in which attention was drawn to the average 
marine loss of $2,782,000 per annum, as well as 239 lives; a certain 
proportion of this loss of life and property being undoubtedly due to 
imperfect knowledge of the currents. It was also urged that if the 
number of narrow escapes of vessels from disaster or wreck were known, 
this would add a powerful argument in favour of proceeding with the 
work forthwith. 
A practical commencement was made in the following season of 
1890, under the supervision of the Director of the Meteorological 
Service. By 1893, gauges had been placed at St. John, N.B., Quebec 
and South-west point, Anticosti; as well as a trial station on the Mag- 
dalen islands in the middle of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The prelim- 
inary steps above referred to, and the early attempts made, are fully 
described in the first Report of Progress (1). 
GENERAL METHODS EMPLOYED. 
At the outset the chief desire of the shipping interests was to 
obtain information regarding the tidal streams and currents on the 
leading steamship routes. Many wrecks were attributed to unknown 
currents, and definite information on the subject was of primary im- 
portance. The preliminary information collected served to show that 
extremely little was known regarding the tides and currents of Canada, 
beyond the “Establishment” at a certain number of ports, and an 
approximation to the range of the tide; such data having been deter- 
mined during the early Admiralty surveys of these coasts. There was 
also a crude attempt to publish tide tables for Quebec, by a difference of 
time from London Bridge. Some early tidal observations were found 
at Halifax in the archives at the Dock yard. The gathering of this 
fragmentary information, and the beginning of regular observations 
at a few places in a somewhat tentative way, was all that had been done 
