ADDRESS. lxi 
Brittany, Wales, Cornwall, &c.; thus Mausmai signifies in Khasia the Stone 
of Oath ; Mamloo, the Stone of Salt ; Mauflong, the Grassy Stone, just as in 
Wales, Penmaenmawr signifies the Hill of the Big Stone; and in Brittany a 
Menhir is a Standing Stone, and a Dolmen a Table Stone, &c. 
At the date of Col. Yule’s, as of my visit to these people, our intercourse 
with them was limited, and not always friendly ; we were ignorant of their 
language, and they themselves were far from communicative. Of late, how- 
ever, the country has been more opened up, and the establishment of a Bri- 
tish cantonment amongst them renders it all the more important that the 
inquiry into their origin, language, beliefs, customs, &c. should be followed 
up without delay. This will now be done, thanks to your representations ; 
and I cannot doubt that it will throw great light upon that obscure and 
important branch of Prehistoric Archeology, the Megalithic monuments of 
Western Europe. 
The Council of the Association, upon the recommendation of the Biological 
Section, appointed a committee to report upon the subject of the Government 
of the Natural-History Collections of the British Museum; which resulted in 
a deputation which represented to the Prime Minister inthe name of the 
Council, that it was desirable that these collections should be placed under 
the control of a single officer, who should be directly responsible to a Minister 
of the Crown ; and that this opinion was shared by an overwhelming majo- 
rity of British naturalists. The reasons stated were, that there appeared no 
reason why the National Collections of Natural History should be administered 
in a way different from that which was found applicable to the Royal Gar- 
dens and Botanical Collections at Kew, the Museum of Practical Geology, and 
the Royal Observatory at Greenwich*, and that the interposition of any Board 
or Committee between the Superintendent of the Collections and the Govern- 
ment must interfere with the responsibility of the Superintendent and the 
efficient control of the Minister. 
It was not the first time that this subject had been brought before Her 
Majesty’s Government: since ten years previously a few Naturalists, consisting 
of Messrs. Bentham, Busk, Darwin, Huxley, Dr. Carpenter, and myself, 
together with the late Professors Lindley, Henslow, Harvey, and Henfrey, 
had presented a memorial to Mr. Disraeli, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, 
embodying precisely the same views as to the government of the Natural- 
History Department of the British Museum, together with a scheme for the 
administration of the whole Metropolitan Natural-History Collections, Geolo- 
gical and Botanical; and I have only to add, regarding this document, that 
the surviving memorialists have not during the ten intervening years, found 
reason to alter the views therein expressed on any vital point. 
Of the objections to the present system of government by Trustees, some of 
the most grave have been stated by Mr. Andrew Murray in a communication t 
* Since writing the above, I have been reminded of the constitution of the Board of 
Visitors to the Royal Observatory by the Astronomer Royal, who has fayoured me with 
copies of the Regulations of the Royal Observatory (1852), and of his Report (for 1868) 
to the Board of Visitors. 
From a perusal of this document, I find that the Board of Visitors is authorized to 
direct the Astronomer Royal to make such observations as the Board shall think proper ; 
to inspect the instruments, and to communicate with the Lords of the Admiralty upon the 
arrangements for keeping them in order; to make any suggestions to the Lords of the 
Admiralty touching the Observatory, and to require of the Astronomer Royal every three 
months, a copy of the observations made, with a view to printing them. I also gather 
that, for the efficient administration of all the duties of the Observatory, the Astronomer 
Royal is solely responsible to the Lords of the Admiralty, 
T Report for 1867. Transactions of Sections, p. 95. 
