PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS, B.A., 1871. 141 



One of the most valuable services to science 

 which the British Association has performed has 

 been the establishment, and the twenty-nine years' 

 maintenance, of its Observatory. The Royal 

 Meteorological Observatory of Kew was built 

 originally for a Sovereign of England who was a 

 zealous amateur of astronomy. George the Third 

 used continually to repair to it when any celestial 

 phenomenon of peculiar interest was to be seen ; 

 and a manuscript book still exists filled with 

 observations written into it by his own hand. 

 After the building had been many years unused, 

 it was granted, in the year 1842, by the Commis- 

 sioners of Her Majesty's Woods and Forests, on 

 application of Sir Edward Sabine, for the purpose 

 of continuing observations (from which he had 

 already deduced important results) regarding the 

 vibration of a pendulum in various gases, and for 

 the purpose of promoting pendulum observations 

 in all parts of the world. The Government granted 

 only the building no funds for carrying on the 

 work to be done in it. The Royal Society was 

 unable to undertake the maintenance of such an 

 observatory ; but, happily for science, the zeal of 



