336 SECTIONAL TRANSACTIONS.—A. 
way, and Admiral Dominik, the President of the Deutsche Seewarte, put forward the 
definite proposal that the best way of commemorating the work of the First Polar 
Year would be to repeat it. The suggestion was taken up and approved by the 
International Meteorological Organisation, and they appointed an international com- 
mission to study the project. The International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics 
also adopted the suggestion with enthusiasm and appointed a sub-committee. 
According to the plan which has received international approval, a number of 
stations will be occupied in polar regions, and so far as possible all those used in 
1882-83 will be re-occupied. Owing to the improvement in transport most of the 
stations can now be reached without the employment of special ships. Therefore, 
instead of the large expeditions which went out in 1882, each station will be manned 
by a party of three or four who will reach their destination in most cases without any 
great difficulty. Up to the present fourteen nations have signified their intention 
of establishing stations in the Arctic, while it is hoped that one or two parties will 
proceed to the Antarctic. The scientific work will be directed to the investigation of 
the four great problems : 
1. the lower atmosphere, in order to follow through the changes of the air in polar 
regions as part of the great circulation of the atmosphere ; 
2. the investigation of the upper atmosphere—at present very little is known about 
the conditions in the stratosphere in high latitudes ; 
3. the magnetic force, especially its regular changes and the conditions during 
magnetic storms ; 
4. the frequency and distribution of the aurora, especially its height in the atmos- 
phere. Special attention will be devoted to correlating the appearance of the aurora 
with the magnetic field of the earth. 
The number of problems which have arisen during recent years in these four 
branches of knowledge is very great, and they cannot all be studied in one year. It 
has, therefore, been decided to concentrate on those problems which require 
simultaneous observations for one year over the whole polar cap. Problems which 
can be investigated at any one station at any convenient time are to be given a 
secondary place. Many new methods of investigation which were not available in 
1882 will be adopted, chiefly the much greater use of self-recording instruments, the 
hourly observations of terrestrial magnetism being replaced by the records of 
magnetographs. The investigation of the upper atmosphere in polar regions gives 
rise to many difficult problems. In civilised countries balloons carrying instruments 
are sent up as high as possible. When the instruments fall they are usually found 
within the course of a few days and returned by the finder. The chance of recovering 
instruments in this way is practically nil in polar regions, therefore other methods 
have to be employed. Instruments which will automatically signal by radio the 
temperature and pressure at different heights have been developed and it is hoped 
will be extensively used, although they are very expensive. 
Special observatories are to be established on mountain tops, when such exist 
near to stations established nearer sea level. Observations of temperature, humidity, 
wind and cloud motion from these mountain stations will give considerable information 
regarding the physical conditions of the upper atmosphere. 
The methods developed by Prof. Carl Stormer for determining the height of the 
aurora through simultaneous photographs taken at the end of long base lines will be 
used at several stations, and it is hoped in this way that a great deal of information 
will be obtained regarding the physics of the aurora. 
Thirty-five countries have signified their intention of taking part in the work of 
the Second Polar Year; of these the following countries intend to send parties into 
polar regions, or establish new stations in high latitudes within their own territory : 
Austria, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Holland, 
Iceland, Japan, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States. 
The Royal Society of London and the Royal Society of Edinburgh have established 
a committee to organise the effort of Great Britain. This committee provisionally 
suggested that Great Britain might re-establish the station at Fort Rae and an 
aerological station on Ben Nevis, while if funds were available a second station might 
be established in Canada. Government has promised to provide £10,000 which will 
be sufficient for establishing and maintaining the station at Fort Rae. If the 
remaining part of the programme is to be carried out, it will necessitate the provision 
of additional sums from private sources, At the moment the Committee is con- 
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