KEW OBSERVATORY 159 



mendations at least had important results. As for 

 Kew, the observatory, now under the honorary 

 superintendence of Francis Ronalds, emerged with 

 credit from an investigation by a committee of the 

 Council, which reported in favour of its maintenance 

 because it afforded a ' local habitation ' to the 

 Association and opportunity for members to carry 

 out physical inquiries, was already attracting the 

 attention of foreign scientific men, and was proving 

 its worth, among other directions, in that of 

 forming a testing-house for instruments, while ' a 

 systematic inquiry into the intricate subject of 

 atmospheric electricity ' had ' in effect furnished the 

 model of the processes conducted at the Royal 

 Observatory.' The possibility of obtaining Govern- 

 ment support for the institution, or of handing it over 

 as a going concern, continued to occupy the atten- 

 tion of the Committee and the Council, but the time 

 was not ripe, and as the work developed the Associa- 

 tion was even compelled largely to increase its annual 

 grants to the observatory. Nevertheless, the general 

 policy already denned in regard to grants of money 

 by the Association was maintained in regard to the 

 functions of the observatory : thus, it is described 

 in the report of 1850 as ' an experimental observatory, 

 devoted to open out new physical inquiries, and to 

 make trial of new modes of inquiry, but only in a 

 few selected cases to preserve continuous records of 

 passing phenomena.' In this year the Royal Society 

 allotted 100, out of the Government grant, for new 

 instruments to be tried at Kew, and, as will be seen, 

 subsequently devoted considerable sums to the obser- 

 vatory, at intervals down to the point when it was 

 taken over by the Society in 1872. The construction 



