no 



NATURE 



[_Dcc. 5, 1878 



intention of devoting annually for five years 4,000/. to the same 

 object, thus anticipating the special purpose which Mr. Jodrell 

 had in view. Thereupon, with that gentleman's consent, his 

 donation was temporarily funded, and the proceeds applied to 

 the general purposes of the Society until some other scheme for 

 its appropriation shall be approved. In April last I received a 

 further communication from Mr. Jodrell, declaring it to be his 

 wish and intention that, subject to any appropriation of the sum 

 which we might, with the approval of the Society, make during 

 his lifetime, it should immediately on his death be incorporated 

 with the Donation Fund, the annual income in the meantime going 

 to the general revenue of the Society. Upon this subject I have 

 now to state that since the receipt of that letter Mr. J odrell has 

 approved of 1,000/. of the sum being contributed to a fund 

 presently to be mentioned. 



I have also to inform you of a check for 1,000/. having been 

 placed in my hands by our Fellow, Mr. James Young, of Kelly, 

 to be expended in the interests of the Society in such manner as 

 I should approve. 



Mr. De La Rue, to whose beautiful experiments I shall have 

 occasion to refer, has presented to the Society both the letter- 

 press and the exquisitely engraved facsimiles of the electric 

 discharges described in his and Dr. Hugo Miiller's paper, and 

 which have appeared with that paper in the Transactions. 



Our Fellow, Dr. Bigsby, has presented seven copies of his 

 "Thesaurus Devonico-carboniferus " for distribution, and they 

 have been distributed accordingly. 



A very valuable addition to our gallery of deceased eminent 

 Fellows has been the gift, by Mr. Leonard Lyell, of a copy in 

 marble, by Theed, of the bust of his uncle, the late Sir Charles 

 Lyell, F.R.S., together with a pedestal. This is the best like- 

 ness of the late eminent geologist that has been executed, and is 

 in every respect a satisfactory one. 



I have the gratification of announcing to you, that through 

 the munificence of a limited number of Fellows, means have 

 been advanced for reducing the fees to which all ordinary 

 Fellows in future elected will be liable. That these fees, though 

 not higher than the most economical expenditure on the part of 

 the Society for its special purposes demanded, were higher than 

 it was expedient to maintain if any possible means for reducing 

 them could be obtained, was not only my own opinion but that 

 of many Fellows. They exceed considerably those of any other 

 scientific society in England or abroad ; their amount has occa- 

 sionally prevented men of great merit from having their names 

 brought forward as candidates, and they press heavily, especially 

 upon those who, with limited incomes, have other scientific 

 societies to subscribe to. Nor does it appear to me as otherwise 

 than regrettable that so high an honour as Fellowship of the 

 Royal Society, the only one of the kind in England that is 

 limited as to the number annually elected, and selective in 

 principle, should be attainable only at a heavy pecuniary expen- 

 diture. It is true that our Fellows receive in return annually 

 volumes of publications of great value to science generally ; but 

 these treat of so many branches of knowledge that it is but a 

 fraction of each that can materially benefit the recipient, while 

 their bulk entails an additional expenditure ; and now that the 

 individual papers published in the Transactions are separately 

 obtainable, the advantages of Fellowship are less than they were 

 when to obtain a treatise on his own subject a specialist had 

 either to join the Society, or to purchase a whole volume or a 

 large part of it annually. 



It was not, however, till I had satisfied myself that the annual 

 income of the Society, though not ample, was sufficient for its 

 ordinary purposes, that its prospects in other points of view were 

 good, and that the expenditure upon publication was the main, if 

 not the sole, obstacle to a reduction of fees, that I consulted your 

 treasurer on the subject of taking steps to attain this object. 



My first idea was to create, by contributions of small amount, 

 a fund, the interest of which should be allowed to accumulate ; 

 and when the income of the accumulated capital reached a 

 sufficient amount to enable the Society to take the step without 

 loss of income, to reduce either the entrance fee or annual con- 

 tribution ; and to which fund Mr. Young's gift should be 

 regarded as the first donation. 



This propoi^l was in so far entertained by your Council that 

 they resolved'to establish a Publication Fund, and to place Mr. 

 Young's gift to the credit thereof ; and further, appointed a 

 committee to consider and report upon the Statutes of the Society 

 concerning the fees. 



The movement, once set on foot, met with an unexpectedly 



enthusiastic reception ; several Fellows, with the best means of 

 forming a judgment, not only approved of it, but offered liberal 

 aid, urging that the reduction of fees should be the first and im- 

 mediate object, and that, if such a course were thought de- 

 sirable, the means of carrying it out would surely be forth- 

 coming. On this your Treasurer prepared for my consideration 

 a plan for raising io,occ/., the sum required for effecting any 

 material reduction ; and we resolved to ascertain by private in- 

 quiry whether so large an amount could be obtained. 



Here again our inquiries were responded to in a spirit of, I 

 may say, unexampled liberality : in a few weeks upwards of 

 8,000/. was given or promised by twenty Fellows of the Societyj 

 and I need hardly add that the remaining 2,000/. was contributed 

 very shortly afterwards. 



At a subsequent meeting of the Council it was resolved : — 



I. — That the sums referred to as the Publication Fund> 

 as well as those received or that may be hereafter received, 

 for the purpose of relieving future ordinary Fellows from 

 the Entrance Fee, and for reducing their Annual Contribu- 

 tion, be formed into one fund. 



2. — That the Entrance Fee for ordinary Fellows be hence- 

 forth abolished ; and that the Annual Contribution for 

 ordinary Fellows hereafter elected be three pounds (3/.). 

 Also, that the inconie of the Fund above-mentioned be 

 applied, so far as is requisite, to make up the loss to^ the 

 Society arising from these remissions and reductions. 



3. — That the account of this Fund be kept separate ; and 

 that the annual surplus of income, after providing for the 

 remission and reduction above recommended, be re-invested, 

 until the income from the Fund reaches 600/. So soon as 

 the annual income reaches this amount, any surplus of 

 income in any year, after providing for the remission and 

 reduction above-mentioned, shall be available, in the first 

 instance, in aid of publication and for the promotion of 

 research. 



A list of subscribers to this Fund will be placed in the hands 

 or every Fellow, with the information that it will be kept open 

 for future contributions, in the interests of research and of tlie 

 Society's publications. I hope that it will be largely and speedily 

 augmented, and that it may eventually reach an amount which 

 will provide us with the means of accomplishing as much as is 

 eiifected by the Government Fund, upon our own sole and undi- 

 vided responsibility. I must not conclude my notice of this 

 movement without a mention of those whose encouragement and 

 liberality have most largely promoted it ; and first of all, Mr. 

 Spottiswoode, to whose counsel and active co-operation through- 

 out, its success is mainly due ; Messrs. Young's and Jodrell's 

 contributions have already been alluded to, they have been sup- 

 ported by others : — 2,000/. from Sir Joseph Whitworth, i,coo/. 

 from Sir W. Armstrong, and 500/. each from His Grace the 

 Duke of Devonshire, Mr. De La Rue, Messrs. Spottiswoode and 

 Eyre, Dr. Siemens, and the Earl of Derby, and 250/. from Dr. 

 Gladstone. The balance is the joint contributions of thirty-two 

 Fellows. 



I have to mention your obligations to Dr. W. Farr for the 

 labour he has bestowed on ascertaining these vital and other 

 statistics of the Society, upon an accurate knowledge of which 

 the calculations for the reduction of fees had to be based ; and 

 to Mr. Bramwell for constructing a table showing to what extent 

 the above changes will affect the Society's present and future 

 income. It may interest you to know that the contributions of 

 ordinary Fellows in future to be elected, is but little over that 

 which was required of all Fellows from the very commencement 

 of the Society's existence, namely, is. per week, and that the 

 last Fellow who paid that sum died in 1869. So recent (1823) 

 has been the augmented scale of payment in force up to the 

 present date. 



Looking back over the five years during which I have occu- 

 pied this chair I recognise advances in scientific discovery and 

 research at home and abroad far greater than any previous semi- 

 decade can show. I do not here allude to such inventions as the 

 telephone, phonograph, and microphone, wonderful as they are,, 

 and promising immediate results of great importance to the com- 

 munity, nor even to those outcomes of great research and high 

 attainments, the harmonic analyser of Sir W. Thomson, the 

 radiometer and otheoscope of Crookes, the bathometer and 

 gravitation meter of Siemens, but to those discoveries and 

 advances which appeal to the seeker of knowledge for its own 

 sake, whether as developing principles, suggesting new fields of 



