ADDRESS. XCl 



for working out the spherical harmonic analysis of terrestrial magnetism over 

 the whole earth. A recalculation of the harmonic analysis for the altered 

 state of terrestrial magnetism of the present time has been undertaken by 

 Adams. He writes to me that he has " already begun some of the iutroduc- 

 " tory work, so as to be ready when Sir Edward Sabine's Tables of the values 

 " of the Magnetic Elements deduced from obseryation are completed, at once 

 " to make use of them," and that he intends to take into account terms of 

 at least one order beyond those included by Gauss. The form in which 

 the requisite data are to be presented to him is a magnetic Chart of the 

 whole surface of the globe. Materials from scientific travellers of all 

 nations, from our home magnetic observatories, from the magnetic obser- 

 vatories of St. Helena, the Cape, Van Diemen's Land, and Toronto, and 

 from the scientific observatories of other countries have been brought to- 

 gether by Sabine. Silently, day after day, night after niglit, for a quarter 

 of a century he has toiled with one constant assistant always by his side 

 to reduce these observations and prepare for the great work. At this moment, 

 while we are here assembled, I believe that, in their quiet summer retirement 

 in Wales, Sir Edward and Lady Sabine are at work on the magnetic Chart 

 of the world. If two years of life and health are granted to them, science 

 will be provided with a' key which must powerfully conduce to the ultimate 

 opening up of one of the most refractory enigmas of cosiuical physics, the 

 cause of terrestrial magnetism. 



To give any sketch, however slight, of scientific investigation performed 

 during the past year would, even if I were competent for the task,_far ex- 

 ceed the limits within which I am confined on the present occasion. _A 

 detailed account of work done and knowledge gained in science Britain 

 ought to have every year. The Journal of the Chemical Society and the 

 Zoological Eecord do excellent- service by giving abstracts of all papers 

 published in their departments. The admirable example afforded by the 

 German "Fortschritte" and "Jahresbericht" is before us; but hitherto, so far 

 as I know, no attempt has been made to foUow it in Britain. It is true that 

 several of the annual volumes of the Jahresbericht were translated ; but a 

 translation, published necessarily at a considerable interval of time after the 

 original, cannot supply the want. An independent British publication is for 

 many obvious reasons desirable. The two publications, in German and 

 English, would, both by their differences and by their agreements, illustrate 

 the progress of science more correctly and usefuUy than any single work 

 could do, even if appearing simultaneously in the two languages. It seems 

 to me that to promote the establishment of a British Year Book of Science is 

 an object to which the powerful action of the British Association would be 

 thoroughly appropriate. 



In referrhig to recent advances in several branches of science, I simply 

 choose some of those which have struck me as most notable. 



Accurate and minute measurement seems to the non-scientific imagination 

 a less lofty and dignified work than looking for something nev/. But nearly 

 all the grandest discoveries of science have been but the rewards of accurate 

 measurement and patient long-continued labour in the minute sifting of 

 numerical results. The popular idea of Newton's grandest discovery is that 

 the theory of gravitation flashed into his mind, and so the discovery was 

 made. It was by a long train of mathematical calculation, founded on 

 results accumulated through prodigious toil of practical astronomers, that 

 Newton first demonstrated the forces urging the planets towards the Sun, 

 determined the magnitudes of those forces, and discovered that a force fol- 



