XIV PROCEEDINGS, AUGUST. 



know how far our opportunity of acceptance may be extended. We have 

 not, of course, the slightest right to dictate to the executors of Mr. Leake's 

 will, but we might suggest that the matter should not be finally disposed 

 ■of until ample time is granted to us to avail ourselves of the bequest. As 

 far as regards the proposed association of this fund with the University, I 

 <;an only speak for myself, and may not commit the Council to any opinion 

 that I may now express. We must all be struck with the very direct and 

 practical character of JVIr. Eussell's suggestions. He contemplates chiefly 

 the establishment of an Observatory, and the means of carrying on its work. 

 No doubt in a new community like ours the immediate practical work is a 

 great consideration. But as far as I can judge, the University Professor- 

 ships in Astronomy in the Old Country look to the teaching of higher mathe- 

 matics very much more than to the manipulation of instruments for the 

 necessary qualification of professorship. I think we should have to invert 

 the order of requirement and to look more to practice than theory, which 

 would involve our taking a course for ourselves for which we need time and 

 consideration. I received to-day a note from Mr. Waterhouse of Launceston, 

 which indicates some of the questions we should have to thrash out. It is 

 not an official note, and I wiU trust to my friend's forgiveness if, with your 

 permission, I read it. 



'•' Launceston, August 4th, 1892. 

 " My Dear Mr. Clarke, — I am afraid that Mr. Walker has considerably 

 over-estimated my powers of making any helpful suggestions as to Mr. 

 Kussell's paper on the Leake trust, and the relation of the University to it. 

 I have ransacked my ideas very fully, but cannot get anything very satis- 

 factory out of them. I must take Mr. Russell's figures as correct, viz., 

 £3,000 for apparatus, etc., and £7,000 for investment, producing £350. If 

 the Lecturer in Mathematics and Physics is to give instruction in popular 

 Astronomy, and is to supervise and control the University, it would not be 

 fair to ask him to do this extra work, — work which is quit eoutside the duties 

 set forth by the University in inviting applications, — without receiving extra 

 remuneration, and this extra remuneration should come out of the Leake 

 trust. The £100 a year proposed by Mr. Russell seems to be a fair esti- 

 mate. The late Professor Adams (Professor of Astronomy and Geometry) 

 at Cambridge, was entrusted with the superintendence and management of 

 the Cambridge Observatory at an extra stipend. I knew very intimately 

 the Observer at the Observatory, and I know this, that he did the usual 

 every day work connected with the Observatory, reporting to the Professor 

 from time to time. If the proposed lecturer has graduated as a wrangler 

 at Cambridge, or has taken a degree in honours at any University where 

 the course requu-es a knowledge of astronomy at all equal to what is re- 

 quired in the Cambridge course, there can be, I think, no doubt of his 

 ability to do all the duties required of him under the Leake trust, especially 

 if he rubbed up his knowledge of the instruments by attending for a few 

 months at the Melbourne or Sydney Observatory prior to taking up his 

 duties here. But what we shall require in order, in my opinion, to qualify 

 the LTniversity to take the benefits under the Leake trust, is an Observer or 

 assistant. There will be, after providing for the £100 a year additional 

 salary to the lecturer, and the £50 required for annual incidental expendi- 

 ture (according to Mr. Russell), only £200 for the observer's salary. That 

 might enable us to get a capable man, without addition, although I rather 

 doubt it. An extra £50 or £100 from the University funds might do so. 

 Such an observer would, of course, be able to demonstrate at the lecturer's 

 astronomical lectures, and might be able to demonstrate in Physics and do 

 the photography. But I do not think that £250 or £300 a year would get 

 us a man with both these capabilities. Still, with a lecturer and an observer 

 to demonstrate at the astronomical lectures, we should, I think, qualify for 

 the Leake trust, though, of course, net so fully as under Mr. Russell's 

 scheme. If to the £200 left from the Leake trust the Government would 

 add the £150 or £200 per annum recently voted to the meteorologist on 



