AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 52-36 



Toronto, St. Helena, Cape of Goodhope, Hobart town, in Van 

 Diemen's Land, at Sraila, Singapore, Madras and Aden, clianged 

 to Bombay. England furnished instruments for observations at 

 Breslau in Prussia, Hammerfort in Norway, Cairo of Egypt, and 

 Algiers. Observations have been made at Berlin, Breda, Brus- 

 sels, Copenhagen, Gottingen, Gotha, Hanover, Heidelberg, Leipsic, 

 Marbourg, Milan, Munich, Philadelphia, Prague and Upsal. 



After Humboldt's discovery of what he called magnetic storms, 

 or disturbances of the magnetic needle, exhibited at same instant^ 

 at great distances on our globe, he proposed to establish " mag- 

 netic houses'' in different places on the globe; and Arago, in 1823, 

 ■erected a small building in the garden of the observatory at Paris, 

 for the exclusive use of magnetics. 



In 1853, these things induced the French Minister of War to 

 address the Academy of Sciences, asking for such observatories to 

 be established in Algeria, He said that Government desired to 

 establish in various geographical portions observatories suitable 

 for registering temperature of air, earth, springs, the pressure of 

 the air, its hygrometrical state, falls of rain, force of winds, storms, 

 the optical and electrical phenomena of the atmosphere; and pro- 

 posed the following locations : 



In the Province of Algier — Algiers, Milonati, Teniet-el-Haad, 

 Orleansville. 



Province of Oran — Oran, Tiaret, Tlemcen andLebdou. 



Province of Constantine — Bona, Constantine, Batna and Bis- 

 kara, 



A committee was appointed. Dissention arose. 



The Abbe Moigno said " he would have given much not to 

 have been present,'' 



Mons. Leverrier said the committee had failed. 



Mons. Biot abused the privilege of his old age and attacked 

 both parties. He spoke of the gigantic labors of Russia in this 

 cause, her large and very extensive quarto volume filled with 

 cyphers^ and that neither in Russia nor any where else, has any 

 real fruit been obtained from these costly publications — they 

 have produced nothing for the advancement of meteorological 

 science — nothing of any practical use, either in theory or its 

 application. 



[Rcvuc Ilorticole, Paris, 16 May, 1856.] 

 Extracts translated by Henry Meigs-. 



CHINESE FLOWER ISLANDS. 

 The Chinese, like all the Orientals, know how to love home 

 enjoyments. They well understand the proverb " our home is 



