236 
SECOND REPORT— - 1832 . 
Secretary of the Society: not only has it afforded many im¬ 
portant results, especially upon the course and progress of baro¬ 
metric fluctuations, but has left a model of a scheme of combined 
exertion which the savans of the nineteenth century would do 
well to imitate. Some account of this Society and of the results 
of their labours, with projected charts of the barometric oscil¬ 
lations as a specimen, have been given to the w^orldby Mr. Daniell 
in an interesting article in the second edition of his Essays*. 
The connexion of barometric changes over large districts is 
very important in the determination of heights by simultaneous 
series of observations carried on for a considerable time at points 
even very distant. Examples of such an application at Paris 
and Clermont are given by Ramond f ; but to avoid incidental 
derangements, the continuation of the observations for some 
time is desirable. 
More lately, a comparison of the barometric changes at some 
principal points in Europe has been given by Prof. Schouw J, 
who has been followed by M. Kamtz in pointing out the con¬ 
nexion of the winds with such changes, and who has illustrated 
the influence of the prevalent aerial currents which traverse 
Europe, though not with apparent regularity, yet at least 
subject to some general laws §. 
Of all the problems in Meteorology, few appear to me so in¬ 
trinsically beautiful as that suggested by the fertile genius of 
Pascal,—the application of the barometer to the measurement 
of heights. It should, I think, be an object of ambition to bring 
this elegant method to the utmost degree of perfection of which 
it is susceptible. The laborious and praiseworthy experimental 
exertions of Roy, Shuckburgh, De Luc, Saussure, and Ra¬ 
mond, united to the theoretical skill of Laplace, have brought 
the method to a degree of precision which a century ago might 
well have been considered unattainable : but we are by no 
means arrived at the point at which improvement becomes 
hopeless, nor do we think that all has been done which might 
have been accomplished since Ramond’s last determination of 
the coefficient of height, and his consequent improvements 
upon the barometrical Tables. 
One important element neglected in the investigations of La¬ 
place (at least only approximately estimated), has lately begun 
to acquire the importance it deserves. I allude to the correc¬ 
tion for moisture. The degree of Saussure’s hygrometer was 
indeed made an element of calculation in some pretty early 
* Meteorological Essays , p. 541. 
t Memoires sur la Formule Baromehique. 
t Bibliotheque Universelle , xxxix. 260. 
§ Ibid. 
