Sciences of Meteorology and T'errestrial Magnetism. 163 



Professor James D. Forbes, his successor in the chair of natural philo- 

 sophy at Edinburgh. But, not to follow the history of meteorology in 

 Scotland in greater detail, I need only here mention, that during the 

 meeting of the British Association in Glasgow in 1855, a meteorological 

 society for Scotland was organized by the exertions of Mr. A. Keith 

 Johnston, the distinguished geographer, and is now in healthy operation. 

 It has many well chosen stations in different parts of the mainland 

 and islands, where extended observations are carried on with instruments 

 of a uniform construction. Tlie results are forwarded to Dr. James 

 Stark, the accomplished secretary, by whom they are discussed, arranged, 

 and from time to time published at the Society's expense. Several 

 members of our Society have joined the Scottish Meteorological, 

 which is well deserving of the support of all who wish well to the cause 

 of science in Scotland. The objects of this Society are somewhat wider 

 than those of the London Society ; they include all which could throw 

 light on the climate of the island, and their observations at sea are 

 already beginning to yield valuable fruit. After a visit last year to the 

 Greenwich, Kew, and Oxford Observatories, and an interview with Mr. 

 Glaisher, I was anxious that the Scottish Society should adopt the 

 English instruments ; and I urged this upon the council. Various 

 objections, however, were made to them. The Secretary and the most 

 experienced members prefer Scottish instruments ; they consider them 

 better, while certainly they are very much cheaper. By those who 

 have used it, the registering barometer, invented by Mr. Thomas 

 Stevenson, of the Northern Lights Board, is considered by far the best 

 ever invented. Then, again, the registering thermometer of Negretti 

 and Zambra, one of those adopted at Kew, is regarded by our Edinburgh 

 friends as very defective ; it is impossible, it seems, to know its index 

 error, which varies with every change of temperature. A good barome- 

 ter by the best Edinburgh makers, as Adie, Bryson, and others, can be 

 had for £2 10s., while an Enghsh one, no better, cannot be had for less 

 than £6 10s; a rain gauge costs £1; in London, £3 10s. The Liud 

 gauge, too, is a great improvement on the EngUsli instrument, and no 

 dearer. Some of the instruments they have adopted, and the above 

 grounds are perhaps suflicient to justify the Society in departing from 

 complete uniformity. Before sending out their instruments they are, of 

 course, as at Kew, carefully adjusted and compared with the standards. 

 In conjunction with Mr. Keith Johnston, I have earnestly urged on the 

 Society to attempt the establishment of an automatic registration by 

 means of photography. As yet, however, they have not seen their way 

 to set such a system on foot ; some doubt of its utility, while others 

 are deterred by the expense which, in the first instance, it would 



