249 



but time will not permit me to do more than hint at some few of 

 them. 



In the first place, then, the requirements of Science often necessitate 

 large outlays of money on objects, the importance of which, in the 

 present state of knowledge, can hardly be sufficiently appreciated by 

 a majority of the members of any community. A Government, how- 

 ever enlightened itself, however much alive to the value of the mea- 

 sure suggested, may hesitate in such a case to take upon itself 

 the responsibility of recommending that the whole cost should be 

 borne by the particular nation whose welfare is committed to its 

 care ; this might be a step too much in advance of public intelligence 

 and therefore likely to be condemned. Now there would seem to be 

 no reason why, in such an instance as this, the various civilized 

 nations should not agree to bear the cost between them ; and I am 

 persuaded, that if greater intercommunication took place between 

 foreign cultivators of science and ourselves, this is a result at which 

 we should at last arrive. A better illustration cannot be given of 

 the kind of scientific undertaking, which might be thus parcelled out 

 among various countries, than the scheme which has been for some 

 time under discussion for establishing a reflecting telescope of con- 

 siderable power in some convenient locality in the Southern Hemi- 

 sphere, for the purpose of observing the Southern Nebulse. It is 

 not difficult to demonstrate the importance of this object. The great 

 command of light possessed by the magnificent telescope of our late 

 * distinguished President, Lord Rosse, has enabled him to detect cer- 

 tain configurations in the Nebulae visible in this country, which had 

 escaped the notice of prior observers ; I allude to the discovery of the 

 spiral form of several of these curious objects. Now this is a fact 

 of peculiar interest, as bearing upon important questions of physical 

 astronomy, the question, e.g. whether certain laws prevailing in our 

 own system, and even in many stellar groups comparatively near to 

 us, extend to the very remote regions of space tenanted by the 

 Nebulae. Many ages may indeed elapse before these questions can 

 be solved, but it is a duty we owe to posterity to supply the data 

 required for solving them ; and it is necessary for that purpose that 

 accurate drawings should be now made of the present appearances 

 of these objects, to be compared with the observations of after times. 

 Lord Rosse is at present engaged in making detailed observations 



