509 



Government or Parliament, that the materials exist out of which a 

 Board may be formed which might be expected to give wholesome 

 advice on scientific questions, take on themselves a share of the 

 Government responsibility, and save the country from the bad con- 

 sequences which now flow either from neglecting to take counsel, or 

 from the careless and indeterminate way in which it is sometimes 

 sought and obtained. 



There are other points connected with the important questions to 

 which I have shortly adverted, for which I must refer you to the 

 twelve resolutions of your Council of January 1857 ; and also to the 

 Report of the Parliamentary Committee to the British Association 

 of 1855, already referred to, in which the subject is discussed and 

 examined. 



I anticipate much advantage to science from the circumstance 

 that His Royal Highness The Prince Consort has consented to accept 

 the Presidency of the British Association. Science has no need of a 

 Patron in the ordinary sense of that term; but her interests are 

 much advanced when those who occupy exalted stations, and are 

 endowed with great qualities of mind and heart, are induced to take 

 part in her councils, and become cognizant of the character, views, 

 and requirements of the most distinguished of her cultivators. 



It would appear from the Report of that truly zealous and inde- 

 fatigable officer of the Society, your Treasurer, dated October 1857, 

 that we had then a considerable excess of income over our average 

 ordinary expenditure, that probably we should shortly be in the 

 receipt of annual sums in respect of the Stevenson Bequest, and 

 that on the demise of the tenant for life, we should come into pos- 

 session of the Handley legacy. This therefore renders it probable 

 that we shall have a clear balance at the end of each year ; and in 

 the course of time, as annuitants die and the legacies come into 

 possession, that balance will be augmented. 



Now since the date of this Report, we agreed to appropriate a sum 

 of 2^250 towards the formation of a MS. Catalogue of Scientific 

 Memoirs, a grant which will probably be yearly renewed until that 

 work is completed ; and there can be no doubt that the cost of the 

 printing and publishing the Transactions is increasing and will still 

 increase ; but still we must look forward to a period which may not 

 be tardy in arriving, when we shall have a larger annual surplus to 



VOL. ix. 2 M 



