l82 



NA TURE 



[June 23, 1904 



Recommendations. 



We are of opinion that the registration of the Meteor- 

 ological Office as a company under the Joint Stock Com- 

 panies' Acts should be cancelled, that the company should 

 be wound up, and the office reconstituted as a department 

 under the control of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries. 



The necessity for a council of se\'en ha\'ing thus been got 

 rid of, we recommend that the office be placed under the 

 control of a man of science as director of meteorology, 

 appointed after consultation with the Royal Society, but 

 responsible to the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, and 

 mafcing his annual report to that department. We recom- 

 mend also the appointment of an advisorv board, consisting 

 of the hydrographer to the Admiralty, a representative of 

 the Board of Trade, and one of the Board of Agriculture 

 and Fisheries, and two members nominated by the Royal 

 Society. The functions of the advisory beard should be 

 consultative only, the director being responsible to the 

 Board of Agriculture and Fisheries for administration. 



We recommend also that a second officer be appointed to 

 act as scientific assistant to the director, to assist him in 

 the general management of the office and in the discussion 

 of such scientific problems as may arise. 



The mean annual cost of this arrangement, as compared 

 with that for the present council, we estimate thus : — 



Present . 

 Council ... 

 Secretary 



Iriatigeinent I Proposed Arrangenietit 



,£^850 , Director ^800 rising to £1000 



625 Scientific Assistant ... 450 



/1475 



Mean 



.^1350 



The fixed parliamentary grant of 15,300/. should be trans- 

 ferred to the vote for the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries. 



Under such an arrangement the anomaly would cease of 

 what is practically a department of the public service, 

 though nominally a joint stock company, paying for postal 

 and telegraph services money out of its fi.xed income. The 

 charge for these services would not appear in the estimate, 

 though undoubtedly the revenue would be the loser by the 

 amount now repaid out of the parliamentary grant. The 

 director of meteorology would not then feel, as the council 

 now does, that the more complete and rapid the distribution 

 of forecasts and warnings is made, the less money remains 

 for scientific research and for overtaking arrears in the 

 statistical work of the department. 



Further, we judge it important that the Post Office should 

 make arrangements at the twenty-seven reporting stations 

 in the United Kingdom for the transmission of daily tele- 

 graphic reports one hour earlier than the present one of 

 S.15 to 8.30 a.m., and that storm warnings should, if 

 practicable, have priority over all private messages at all 

 hours. 



We would direct attention to the e.\pediency of testing 

 the efficacy of wireless telegraphy in providing advance 

 news of weather in the Atlantic. Such news would in- 

 calculably strengthen the forecast and warning service, and 

 might, we believe, be obtained regularly over an experimental 

 period by cooperation either with the .Admiralty, the ocean 

 steamship companies, or both. We would urge that no 

 unnecessary delay should take pUue in organising this 

 experiment. 



We recommend that in future Ihe cost of instrumenls 

 supplied to His Majesty's ships be borne upon the Navy 

 votes, except where such instruments are intended for use 

 in research or observation specially called for bv the director 

 of meteorology. 



We consider that the premises now rented bv the council 

 are neither suitable in character nur adequate in space for 

 the present requirements of the office, and that others should 

 be provided wherein the staff might perform their duties 

 under more favourable hygienic conditions, and necessary 

 accommodation for the rapidly growing library might be 

 secured. 



We recommend that the staff employed in the library, 

 the statistical branch and observatory branch, should be 

 augmented. The steps necessary to give effect to this and 

 the preceding recommendation can best be determined when 

 the future of the office has been decided upon. 



We have carefully considered the effect of our recommend- 



NO. 1808. VOL. 70] 



ations upon the apportionment of the present grant of 

 15,300/. 



Om' recommendations would involve a net increase of 

 440/. .\nother effect would be to reduce the Post Office 

 revenue by the sum of about 2000/., and to transfer to Navy 

 votes, for instruments supplied to the Royal Navy, about 

 500/. 



In default of an increase to the grant, the small increased 

 expenditure which we have recommended would have either 

 to be postponed or to be met from economies on other 

 branches of the work of the office. 



We have not included in the figures above given any 

 increase in the average amount of the grant allocated to 

 scientific research, nor have we found means of providing 

 for increased telegraph e.\penditure which the adoption of 

 the recommendations as to the transmission of earlier daily 

 telegraphic reports, and of storm warnings, will very prob- 

 ably entail on the Post Office. 



The evidence before us has shown conclusi\pl\- the im- 

 portance of further scientific research, for which we trust 

 that funds may be forthcoming in the near future. 



In minorit\- reports Sir Herbert Maxwell and Sir William 

 .\bney express disagreement with that part of the report 

 which deals with the action of the Meteorological Council 

 in deciding to discontinue the annual payment to Fori 

 William Observatory, involving the abandonment of the 

 observatory on Ben Nevis. 



Mr. Dewar objects to the action taken by the coimcil in 

 connection with superannuation : and Sir Francis Hopwood 

 and .Mr. T. L. Heath are unable to concur in the recom- 

 mendations made by a majority of the committee (a) in so 

 far as they W'ould necessarily involve an increase in the 

 annual grant, and (b) in so far as they relate to the transfer 

 of this grant from the vote for scientific investigations, &c., 

 to that of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries. 



Till; following announcement of a munificent gift for 

 scientific research appeared in Monday's Times : — Mrs. 

 Percy Sladen, of Northbrook Park, Devonshire, in the desire 

 to perpetuate the memory of her late husband, Mr. W. P. 

 Sladen, sometime secretary and vice-president of the 

 Uinnean .Society, has undertaken to devote the sum of 

 20,000/. to the promotion of scientific research, particularly 

 in the subjects in which he was chiefly interested. She 

 proposes to assign this sum under the name of the Percx 

 .Sladen memorial fund to certain trustees, in the first place 

 of her own appointment, who are directed to employ the 

 income arising therefrom, in their uncontrolled discretion, 

 to " any research or investigation in natural science, and 

 more especially in the sciences of zoology, geology, and 

 anthropology." They are also empowered, if they think fit, 

 to eiccumulate the income for the purpose of fitting out, ur 

 assisting to fit out, any expedition designed to further such 

 research. The following gentlemen, whom Mrs. .Sladen has 

 requested to be the first trustees, have consented to serve : — 

 her brother. Dr. Tempest .\ndprson, of York; .Mr. Bailey 

 Saunders, .Mr. Henry Bury, Dr. Henry Woodward, F.R.S., 

 Prof. Howes, F.R.S., and Prof. Herdman, F.R.S. On the 

 occurrence of any vacancy among these trustees, .Mrs. 

 .Sladen reserves to herself the right to nominate their 

 successors ; but by the deed of endowment it is provided that 

 eventually five trustees shall be severally nominated for a 

 period of five years each by the following bodies in rotation, 

 so far as they may have signified their acceptance of the 

 power of appointment : — the Royal Society, the Linnean 

 Society, the trustees of the British Museum, and the Uni- 

 versities of Oxford and Cambridge. 



.\s a result of a petition in iqo2 from the Johannesburg 

 branch of the South African Association for the ,'\dvanre- 

 nienl of Science to the Governor of the colony, a dovern- 



