206 PKESIDENX'S ADDKESS. 



thence there were in store discoveries which would one day prove 

 of the greatest value and importance. Amongst the few facts 

 already ascertained is, that the lowest temperature does not co- 

 incide with the geographical pole, but is concentrated on two 

 points; one in Siberia, the other in ]^orth America. It is to 

 Lieut. Weyprecht, the discoverer of Franz Josef Land, that the 

 world is indebted for the suggestion that the North Pole should 

 be encircled by a series of fixed observatories, and that two sta- 

 tions should be established also in the Antarctic Seas. I have 

 not the time, nor is this the place, to enter into the history of 

 this movement. It must suffice to say that by the 1st of May, 

 1881, Professor Wild was enabled to say that the eight stations 

 needed had been secured. 



In July, 1881, at S. Petersburg, it was determined that the 

 observations should, be commenced at all stations in the Polar 

 regions, as well as in those of the temperate zone, as soon as 

 possible after August 1, 1882, and that they should be continued 

 until September, 1883. The stations were finally allotted thus : 

 Denmark has charge of Godthaab. America has her post in 

 Lady TranMin Bay, in Smith Sound, the most northerly of all 

 the stations. , Germany in Cumberland Sound, and England at 

 Fort Eae, near the Great Slave Lake. America has also a sta- 

 tion at Point Barrow. Russia occupies the mouth of the Lena, 

 and Holland takes Dickson's Haven. A Prussian branch station 

 has also been established at Moller Bay, in Ifova Zembla. Nor- 

 way is responsible for the work at Bosekop, in the Alten Fjord. 

 Sweden selected Spitzbergen; Austria, Jan May en Land; and a 

 station has also been fitted up at Sodankyla, on the Scandinavian 

 Isthmus. The Germans have also secured the help of the Mora- 

 vian missionaries in Labrador, the coast there extending along 

 the line of minimum depression. France has gone far afield, 

 having established a post near Cape Horn ; and a third German 

 party is stationed on one of the islands of Southern Georgia, some 

 1,100 miles fi'om Cape' Horn. Materials for a comparison on a 

 very extended scale will therefore be forthcoming from all parts 

 of the world. 



All meteorological and magnetic phenomena will be observed 



