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1876.] Proceedings of Societies. 383 
There is also good reason to hope that means will be found to defray the 
expenses of non-resident members in traveling to and from the meetings, 
The Academy, Professor Henry said, is becoming in a certain sense a 
leader of public opinion in respect to the expression of calm judgment 
and weight of scientific authority. This was its appropriate position, 
The recent instances in which the government has sought its aid were 
then briefly mentioned : its judgment had been required in respect to 
microscopic determination (with reference to collecting duties) of the 
proportions of wool imported in invoices of calves hair; and it was 
estimated that a million of dollars would be saved to the revenue in con- 
sequence. Still more recently investigations had been ordered to ascer- 
tain the value of certain applications to the paper used in preparing 
fractional currency ; and as to the crystallization of different grades of 
sugar, as a means for classifying them. The direction of the scientific 
part of the Polaris expedition was intrusted to the Academy. Dr. Emi 
Bessels has been engaged in preparing the material obtained for publica- 
tion. Three volumes are nearly complete. They will contain the re- 
sults in the departments of hydrography, meteorology, and astronomy. 
A fourth volume is in preparation, of which Admiral Davis has charge ; 
this will contain the narrative of the expedition and much biographical 
information ; its expense is borne by the Navy Department. The legac 
left by Alexander Dallas Bache to the Academy has been applied, (1) to 
the preparation of a magnetic survey of the United States; (2) to ob- 
servations on sun-spots, conducted at Cambridge, Mass. ; (3) to certain 
researches on light and heat. The first of these undertakings is in a 
condition to report considerable progress. The map when completed 
will prove of important service for surveying purposes and topography 
generally, as it will determine the dip and direction of the needle for all 
localities, By the record of these data now, the students of the earth’s 
magnetism will have a means in future years to ascertain the rate and laws 
of the great secular variations, as yet only imperfectly understood. The 
observations on the sun were conducted by the late Professor Winlock ; 
Since his death some arrangements have been projected for collating his 
Work and continuing it. The researches on light and heat are carried 
on by Charles Peirce, a son of Prof. Benjamin Peirce. Part of the 
regular work of the Academy consists in having memoirs prepared of its 
deceased members, and the results of this work were stated. 
The following papers were read : The Character of the Eocene Fauna 
of New Mexico, by E. D. Cope ; A Conjectural Restoration of a Pueblo 
of the Mound Builders, by Lewis H. Morgan (in which he took the 
Sround that the Mound Builders were village Indians who had migrated 
m the tropics, and that the mounds were the building-sites of their 
tenement-houses) ; The Geology of Petroleum, by J. S. Newberry; The 
Geological Evidence on the Question of the Cause of the Cold of the 
Teg Period, J. S. ewberry ; The Geological Structure and Topographi- 
: cal Aspects of the Catskill Mountains, by James Hall; The Geological 
