XXX REPORT—1845. 
observatories all over the world, in which the phenomena are registered at 
instants strictly simultaneous, and at intervals of two hours throughout both 
day and night. With the particulars of these national institutions, and of 
the multitude of local and private ones of a similar nature, both in Europe, 
Asia, and America, working on the same concerted plan, so far as the means 
at their disposal enable them, I need not detain you: neither need I enter 
into any detailed explanation of the system of Magnetic Surveys, both by sea 
and land, which have been executed or are in progress, in connexion with, 
and based upon the observations carried on at the fixed stations. These 
things form the subject of Special Annual Reports, which the Committee 
appointed for the purpose have laid before us at our several meetings, ever 
since the commencement of the undertaking ; and the most recent of which 
" will be read in the Physical Section of the present meeting, in its regular 
course. It is sufficient for me to observe, that the result has been the accu- 
mulation of an enormous mass of most valuable observations, which are now 
and have been for some time in the course of publication ; and when thoroughly 
digested and discussed, as they are sure to be, by the talent and industry of 
magnetists and meteorologists, both in this country and abroad, cannot fail 
to place those sciences very far indeed in advance of their actual state. For 
such discussion, however, time must be allowed. Even were all the returns 
from the several observatories before the public (which they are not, and are 
very far from being), such is the mass of matter to be grappled with, and such 
the multitude of ways in which the observations will necessarily have to be 
grouped and combined to elicit mean results and quantitative laws, that several 
years must elapse before the’ full scientific value of the work done can pos- 
sibly be realized. 
Meanwhile, a question of the utmost moment arises, and which must be » 
resolved, so far as the British Association is concerned, before the breaking- 
up of this meeting. The second term of three years, for which the British 
Government and the East India Company have granted their establishments 
—nine in number—will terminate with the expiration of the current year, at 
which period, if no provision be made for their continuance, the observations 
at those establishments will of course cease, and with them, beyond a doubt, 
those ata great many—probably the great majority—of the foreign establish- 
ments, both national and local, which have been called into existence by the 
example of England, and depend on that example for their continuance or 
abandonment. Now, under these circumstances, it becomes a very grave 
subject for the consideration of our Committee of Recommendations, whether, 
to suffer this term to expire without an effort on the part of this Association 
to influence the Government for its continuance, or whether, on the other 
hand, we ought to make such an effort, and endeavour to secure either the 
continuance of these establishments for a further limited term, or the per- 
petuity of this or some equivalent system of observation in the same or dif- 
ferent localities, according to the present and future exigencies of science. 
I term this a grave subject of deliberation, and one which will call for the 
exercise of their soundest judgement ; because, in the first place, this system of 
combined observation is by far the greatest and most prolonged effort of 
scientific co-operation which the world has ever witnessed ; because, moreover, 
the spirit in which the demands of science have been met on this occasion 
by our own Government, by the Company, and by the other governments 
who have taken part in the matter, has been, in the largest sense of the words, 
munificent and unstinting ; and because the existence of such a spirit throws 
upon us a solemn responsibility to recommend nothing but upon the most 
entire conviction of very great evils consequent on the interruption, and very 
great benefits to accrue to science from the continuance of the observations. 
