i88o-i Balfour Stewart; Andrew C. Ramsay 43 1 



Survey of the United States and author of important 

 memoirs published by that Survey, was invited by 

 Warington Smyth on nth March. 



Balfour Stewart, invited by Mr. Bowman on 22nd April, 

 had then been ten years the brilliant Professor of Natural 

 Philosophy at Owens College, Manchester. Five years 

 before he came to the Club he had published in conjunction 

 with Professor Peter Guthrie Tait the suggestive volume 

 on The Unseen Universe, and five years later he was one 

 of those who primarily started the Society for Psychical 

 Research, of which he was elected President. The value of 

 his contributions to science, especially in regard to radiant 

 heat, was recognised by the Royal Society in the award to 

 him of the Rumford Medal in 1868. His death in 1887 at 

 the age of fifty-nine was a severe blow to the progress of 

 physical research in this country. 



The " Mr. Ramsay " who was introduced by Professor 

 Williamson on 22nd was doubtless the genial and accom- 

 plished field-geologist, Andrew Crombie Ramsay, the 

 Director-General of the Geological Survey, who was this 

 year President of the British Association at Swansea. After 

 forty years of unremitting devotion to the public service, 

 and having made many original contributions to geological 

 literature, he was now nearing the time of his retirement. 

 He had been President of the Geological Society, and had 

 been awarded a Royal Medal by the Royal Society, which 

 elected him a Fellow in 1849. He was knighted in 1881 

 on quitting the public service. 



1881. In 1 88 1 the Anniversary Meeting, held on 23rd 

 June, was attended by twenty-three members, Dr. Warren 

 De La Rue being Chairman. The Treasurers submitted a 

 statement showing the expenditure to have fallen to 57 

 los. 4d. and to have left in their hands a balance of no less 

 than 91 55. 3d. No comment appears on the Minute in 

 explanation of the financial statement. The reduction in 

 the number of dinners would at least partly account for the 

 large surplus. But as we have already seen, the Tavern 

 Bill could sometimes admit of reduction in other ways. 



