XXxii REPORT—1850. 
welcomed into the rich marts of our commerce, and into the active localities 
of our manufacturing industry. Europe and America speedily recognized 
the importance of our rising Association, and deputies from every civilized 
nation hastened to our annual congress, assisted at our sectional meetings, 
and have even contributed to our Transactions valuable reports on different 
branches of science. 
It may be interesting to those who are here for the first time to learn the 
names of some of those distinguished individuals by whose exertions and 
talents this Association has attained its present magnitude and position; and 
I feel as if it were peculiarly my duty to do honour to their zeal and their 
labours. Sir John Robison, Professor Johnston, and Professor J. D. Forbes, 
were the earliest friends and promoters of the British Association. They 
went to York to assist in its establishment, and they found there the very 
men who were qualified to foster'and organise it. The Rev. Mr. Vernon 
Harcourt, whose name cannot be mentioned here without the expression of 
our admiration and gratitude, had provided Jaws for its government, and, 
along with Mr. Phillips, the oldest and most valuable of our office-bearers, 
had made all those arrangements by which its success was ensured. Headed 
by Sir Roderick Murchison, one of the very earliest and most active ad- 
vocates of the Association, there assembled at York about 200 of the friends 
of science. Dalton, Pritchard, Greenough, Scoresby, William Smith, Sir 
Thomas Brisbane, Dr. Daubeny, Dr. B. Lloyd Provost of Trinity College 
Dublin, Professor Potter, Lord Fitzwilliam, and Lord Morpeth, took an 
active part in its proceedings; and so great was the interest which they ex- 
cited, that Dr. Daubeny ventured to invite the Association to hold its second 
meeting at Oxford. Here it received the valuable co-operation of Dr. 
Buckland, Professor Powell, and the other distinguished men who adorn 
that seat of literature and science. Cambridge sent us her constellation of 
philosophers—bright with stars of the first magnitude—Whewell, Peacock, 
Sedgwick, Airy, Herschel, Babbage, Lubbock, Challis, Kelland, and Hopkins ; 
while the metropolitan institutions were represented by Colonel Sabine, 
one of our General Secretaries, Mr. ‘Taylor, our Treasurer, Sir Charles 
Lyell, Colonel Sykes, Mr. Brown, Mr. Faraday, Professors Owen and 
Wheatstone, Dr. Mantell, Lord Northampton, Lord Wrottesley, Sir Philip 
Egerton, and Sir Charles Lemon. From Ireland we received the distin- 
guished aid of Lord Rosse, Lord Enniskillen, Lord Adare*, Dr. Robinson, 
Dr. Lloyd, Sir William Hamilton, and Professor Maccullagh ; and men of 
immortal names were attracted from the continents of Europe and America 
—Arago, Bessel, Struve, Liebig, Jacobi, Le Verrier, Encke, Erman, Kupffer, 
Ehrenberg, Matteucci, Rogers, Bache, and Agassiz. The young members 
of the Association, to whom we owe much, and from whom we expect more, 
will excuse me for not making an individual reference to their labours. Their 
day of honour will come when our brief pilgrimage has closed. To them 
we bequeath a matured institution, and we trust that they will leave it to a 
succeeding race with all the life which it now breathes, and with all the 
glory which now surrounds it. 
It has been the custom of some of my predecessors in this Chair, to give a 
brief account of the progress of the sciences during the preceding year ; 
but, however interesting might be such a narrative, it would be beyond the 
power of any individual to do justice to so extensive a theme, even if your 
time would permit, and your patience endure it... I shall make no apology, 
* Now the Earl of Dunraven. 
