KErORT OF THE KEW COMMITTEE. XXXYU 



it appears, be sacrificed by postponement, and, looking to tne extent of 

 the other claims upon the public finances already existing, My Lords 

 have thought it right to defer the consideration of the question until next 

 year.' 



" The letter then further states, that the three Magnetical Observatories 

 at the Cape of Good Hope, St. Helena, and Toronto, which were originally 

 sanctioned in an estimate of about £3000 for three years, had in fact cost 

 £11,000 for that period, and, in all, had put the country to an expense of 

 nearly £50,000. This consideration alone suffices to show the necessity for 

 very careful investigation by the Government before any step is taken which 

 might commit the country to further expense. The circumstances referred 

 to in the letter in question continue in full force; and an important further 

 argument against undertaking the proposed Observatory at Vancouver 

 Island at the present moment is furnished by the political events which have 

 since occurred in China. In General Sabine's able letter of the 1st January, 

 1859, it is stated that, ' without entering into the comparative scientific value 

 of Vancouver Island and Pekin as magnetic stations, — both being highly 

 important, — this much is certain, that, whatever might be the value of either, 

 that value would be greatly enhanced — far more than doubled — by there 

 being a simultaneous and continuous record at both stations; and Sir John 

 Herschel remarks that the importance of a five years' series of observations 

 at one of the proposed stations without the others would be grievously dimi- 

 nished, and the general scope of the project defeated.' 



"As the present state of things in China precludes the establishment of a 

 Magnetic Observatory at Pekin, or any point in the Chinese Empire suffi- 

 ciently to the north to correspond with a station at Vancouver Island 

 (though there is reason to hope that this state of things may be of short 

 duration), it would appear desirable even in the interests of science to postpone 

 the consideration until something more certain can be ascertained as to the 

 possibility of meeting what Sir John Herschel and General Sabine consider 

 such an essential requisite, viz. the commencement and continuance of simul- 

 taneous observations at Vancouver Island and at a point in China nearly in the 

 same parallel of latitude. The interval which must elapse until the political 

 state of affairs in China may render such an establishment possible may be 

 usefully employed in obtaining the most accurate estimate possible of the 

 actual cost of founding and maintaining each station for the period requisite 

 for the complete attainment of the scientific objects in view, so as to enable 

 Her Majesty's Government, when the proper time shall arrive, if they shall 

 decide on doing so, to submit a vote to Parliament with confidence as to the 

 amount of expense which they may ask the nation to defray in the interests 

 of science. 



" I am, Sir, 



" Your obedient Servant, 

 (Signed) " Geo. A. Hamilton." 



" The President of the Royal Society." 



" May 23rd, 18G0. 

 " My dear Sir, — In Mr. Hamilton's letter (returned herewith) he has 

 referred to Sir Charles Trevelyan's communication to Lord Wrottesley of the 

 6th December, 1858, expressing the desire of the Lords Commissioners of 

 the Treasury to postpone to the following year the consideration of the esta- 

 blishment of the Colonial Magnetic Observatories which had been recom- 

 mended by the Royal Society and the British Association for the Advance- 



