Aucust 17, 1899] 
WMA TO RE 
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THE NATIONAL PHYSICAL LABORATORY. 
ee realisation of the scheme for the establishment 
of a National Physical Laboratory is primarily due 
to two addresses delivered before the British Association 
in 1891 and 1895 by Prof. Oliver Lodge and the late Sir 
Douglas Galton respectively. The fact that Sir Douglas 
Galton, when president of the Association, did all in his 
power to support the proposal originally made by Prof. 
Lodge, led to the matter being laid before the Prime 
Minister by a strong deputation. A committee, of 
which Lord Rayleigh was chairman, was then appointed 
by the Treasury, and after taking evidence, reported in 
favour of the establishment of a public institution for 
standardising and verifying instruments, for testing 
materials, and for the determination of physical con- 
stants. They further recommended that the institution 
should be established by extending the Kew Observatory 
in the Old Deer Park, Richmond, and that the Royal 
Society should be invited to control it and to nominate 
a governing body, on which commercial interests should 
be represented, the choice of the members of such body 
not being confined to Fellows of the Society. 
These recommendations were approved, and to give 
effect to them the Government undertook to ask Par- 
liament for 12,000/. for buildings and for 4ooo/. a year. 
A scheme for the management of the new institution 
has been approved by the Treasury, and the first instal- 
ment of the promised grants has been sanctioned by the 
Legislature. The Kew Observatory Committee are 
willing that the Institution which they have managed 
very successfully should be merged in the National 
Physical Laboratory, which will thus become possessed 
of an endownient of 458/. per annum from the Gassiot 
Trust, and of an income of about 2700/. from fees for 
standardising. These receipts have, in the past, rather 
more than covered the expenses of carrying on the work 
of the Observatory. 
The ultimate control of the National Physical Labor- 
atory is placed in the hands of the Royal Society, but 
the constitution of the bodies which manage it directly 
can only be altered with the consent of the Treasury. 
These are an Executive Committee and a General Board. 
The latter is a relatively large body, to which the Execu- 
tive Committee must report annually, and to which it 
must submit its scheme of work for the next year. An 
essential feature in the constitution of the General Board 
is that twelve of its members are nominated by six of 
the great technical societies—viz. the Institutions of Civil, 
Mechanical, Electrical and Naval Engineers, the Iron 
and Steel Institute, and the Society of Chemical In- 
dustry. Six of these representatives of “commercial 
interests” are also to be members of the Executive Com- 
mittee, which will ultimately consist of twelve ordinary 
and five official’ members, of whom the latter are: the 
President of the Royal Society, the Chairman of the 
Committee, the. Permanent Secretary of the Board of 
Trade, and the Treasurer and one of the Secretaries of 
the Royal Society. In the first instance, six members of 
the existing Kew Observatory Committee will also have 
seats on the Executive Committee, but their places will 
not be filled up when their period of office expires. 
Finally, it is in the power of the Executive Committee to 
appoint sub-committees to superintend particular depart- 
ments or investigations. The members of these sub- 
committees need not necessarily be members either of 
the General Board or of the Executive Committee. 
Preliminary arrangements have been in progress for 
some time in order that the National Physical Laboratory 
should be organised as soon as possible after the 
requisite funds were voted by Parliament. 
The six technical societies have nominated their 
representatives, the General Board and Executive Com- 
mittee have been constituted, and general satisfaction 
NO. 1555, VOL. 60] 
will be felt at the announcement that Lord Rayleigh has 
accepted the chairmanship of these bodies. 
On the recommendation of the Executive Committee, 
the Council of the Royal Society has appointed Mr. R. 
T. Glazebrook, F.R.S., now Principal of University 
College, Liverpool, to the important post of Director of 
the National Physical Laboratory. A number of sub- 
committees have also been organised by the Executive 
Committee, which have been requested to make sugges- 
tions preparatory to the drawing up of a detailed scheme 
of work and of the plans of the new buildings. 
The members of the Executive Committee are :— 
Lord Lister, P.R.S., Lord Rayleigh (Chazrman), Mr. 
A. B. Kempe, Treas. R.S., Prof. A. W. Rticker, Sec. 
R.S., and Sir Courtenay Boyle (er officio), Captain W. 
de W. Abney, Sir N. Barnaby, Mr. G. Beilby, Sir E. 
H. Carbutt, Bart., Captain E. W. Creak, R.N., Prof. R. 
B. Clifton, Prof. G. C. Foster, Mr. F. Galton, Prof. O. 
J. Lodge, Sir A. Noble, Prof, J. Perry, Sir W., Roberts- 
Austen, Prof. A. Schuster, Mr. A. Siemens, General 
Sir R. Strachey, Prof. J. J. Thomson, Dr. T. E. ‘Thorpe, 
Sir J. Wolfe Barry. 
In addition to the above, the following are also members 
of the General Board :— j 
Sir M. Foster, Sec. R.S. (ex, officio), Sir F. A. Abel, 
Bart., Prof. W. G. Adams, Prof. W. E. Ayrton, Mr. H. 
Bell, Mr. A. Buchan, Mr. R. E. Crompton, Prof. G. F. 
Fitzgerald, Prof. J. Joly, Lord Kelvin, Mr. J. T. Milton, 
Sir W. H_ Preece, Mr. W. F..Reid, the Earl of Rosse, 
Dr. R. H. Scott, Mr. W. N. Shaw, Mr. C. E. Stromeyer, 
Admiral Sir W. Wharton, Sir W. H. White. 
The following have also been requested to serve on 
one or other of the sub-committees above referred to :— 
Messrs. E. D. Archibald, C. V.: Boys, Prof. H. L. 
Callendar, Messrs. Forbes Carpenter, W. H. M. 
Christie, J. H. Dallmeyer, Prof. J. A. Ewing, Mr. S. Z. 
de Ferrant .Prof. J. A. Fleming, Messrs. R. E. Froude, 
E. H. Griffiths, J. Mansergh, T. Matthews, W. H. Maw, 
Dr. L. Mond, Hon. C. A. Parsons, Prof. A. W. Reinold, 
Captain H. R. Sankey, Messrs. J. Swinburne, G. J. 
Symons, H. A. Taylor, Prof. S. P. Thompson, Messrs. J. 
I. Thornycroft, C. H. Wordingham and A. F. Yarrow. 
It will «thus be seen that the National Physical 
Laboratory is being founded on a wide basis. A definite 
scheme of work will be arranged during the autumn. 
The Director will, it is hoped, take up the duties of his 
office on January 1, 1900, and the planning and erection 
of the new buildings will then proceed with as little delay 
as possible. 
NOTES. 
WE regret to learn that Prof. Bunsen, the veteran chemist, 
is lying seriously ill at his residence in Heidelberg, and that 
little hope is entertained of his recovery. 
M. bE FONVIELLE, writing from Paris, says: ‘‘ M. Janssen 
has left Paris for his usual annual journey to the Observatory on 
the summit of Mont Blanc, to inspect the instruments installed 
there.—The Minister of Finance granted to MM. Hermite, at 
Besancon, the sum of fifty pounds for their experiments with free 
balloons. It is intended to send up a balloon with new record- 
ing apparatus during the forthcoming meeting of the French 
Association at Boulogne.” 
Mr. BALFOUR has consented to take the chair at a festival 
dinner at the end of November in aid of the fund now being 
raised to provide new laboratories at King’s College, London. 
Tue autumn meeting of the Iron and Steel Institute was 
opened at Manchester on Tuesday, under the presidency of Sir 
William Roberts-Austen, K.C.B., F.R.S. 
