1 6 MADEIRA METEOROLOGIC. PART HI. 



research with a fulness and a fervour thus eulogised by 

 his biographer : 



" The exposure and privations which Dr. Mason would have im- 

 peratively prohibited a patient from encountering, he fearlessly and 

 enthusiastically contended with in his own person ; undeterred by the 

 most trying fluctuations of temperature, the prostration attendant on a 

 constant strain of the mind, and the watching that broke in upon that 

 ordinary rest, which even the robust cannot forego, without some 

 degree of suffering. To none would he for a moment depute the task 

 which he had undertaken ; and when all around him were enjoying 

 repose, or courting it, this martyr, as he may be called, to meteoro- 

 logical investigation, passed the night with his instruments and journal; 

 noting down the minutest change which the atmosphere underwent, 

 from the first sinking of the sun to the first indication of its rising." 



Why, then, have those subsequent meteorologists, 

 to whom a merciful Providence has permitted a far longer 

 life than twenty-seven years only from birth to death 

 wherein to make their mark in the world, ejected the 

 name of poor Dr. Mason from all connection with the 

 useful and practical hygrometer he devoted his short but 

 active life and self-sacrificing labours to ? 



On turning to the July number of the " Quarterly 

 Journal of the Meteorological Society of London," I find 

 at pp. 175-6 an unfortunately worded notice of him in a 

 general history of all hygrometers by a late President of 

 that Society. On the sole ground of an article in an old 

 monthly serial, viz. " Records of General Science for 

 July 1836," it is declared that the "new hygrometer" 

 alluded to therein by Dr. Mason (or his executors) was 



