28 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



twelve hundred folio pages yearly, at a subscription price of thirty -six 

 francs. 



The Institution has also received a similar meteorological bulletin 

 from the Royal Observatory at Palermo. In the first number of this, 

 a plan is proposed for distributing simultaneous meteorological obser- 

 vations similar to that which was adopted previous to the war by the 

 Smithsonian Institution, viz : that of furnishing the most important 

 telegraphic stations with meteorological instruments, and instructing 

 the principal telegraphist, or one of his assistants, in the process of 

 making observations. A thoroughly organized system of this kind 

 over the whole United States, with a series of directions for predict- 

 ing the weather at a given place from a knowledge of the condition 

 of the atmosphere at distant points, would be of vast importance to 

 the maritime and agricultural interests, particularly along the Atlan- 

 tic sea-board. It is hoped that as soon as order is restored and peace 

 fully re-established throughout the southern portion of the United 

 States, the system will be revived under still more favorable auspices. 



An important addition to the means at the command of the Insti- 

 tution for this purpose has been furnished by the liberal action of 

 the North American Telegraphic Association, in giving the free use 

 of all its lines for the scientific objects of the Institution. The asso- 

 ciation embraces the Western Union, the American, the Montreal, 

 the Southwestern, and the Illinois and Mississippi Telegraph Com- 

 panies, covering the entire United States and Canada, including the 

 overland line to San Francisco, which, by its charter, is required to 

 transmit without charge scientific despatches for the Institution. 

 The telegraph companies on the Pacific coast have also liberally 

 granted the same privileges. 



I am happy to state in this connexion that efforts have been made 

 to revive and complete the meteorological observations which were 

 collected by the Naval or National Observatory. The records from 

 the log-books of the commercial and naval marine collected uuder 

 the direction of the former superintendent, though imperfectly, and 

 in many cases erroneously interpreted, were valuable contributions 

 to the materials from which the true theory of the general motions 

 of the atmosphere are to be deduced. 



The lake system of meteorology is still kept up under the new 

 superintendent, Col. Raynolds, though the Institution has not re- 

 ceived the copies of the registers for the past year. 



The State Department has furnished the Institution with several 

 meteorological contributions forwarded to it by consuls in foreign 



