Page:Europe in China.djvu/558

540 dropping of a time ball. The movement was taken up by the Surveyor General (J. M. Price) who elaborated the very plan on which the Observatory was subsequently established and suggested the construction, on mount Elgin at Kowloon, of an Observatory, which should be placed under the charge of a professional man to be recommended by the Astronomer Royal, and, whilst procuring storm warnings and meteorological observations, secure the daily dropping of a time ball in front of the Water Police Station. Apart from the subsequent demand for astronomical observations, every essential feature of the present Observatory scheme was proposed in detail by Mr. Price. On 30th October, 1877, Admiral Ryder wrote a letter, warmly supporting Mr. Price's suggestions and adding the recommendation that the observation of tides and currents should also be included in the scheme. Both papers were published in the Government Gazette of 17th November, 1877, and in his Estimates for the year 1878 Sir John included -the sum of $5,000 for the construction of an Observatory. Nothing was, however, done in the matter until some three years later, when another series of papers was published in the Gazette (September 2, 1881), propounding a seemingly new scheme, which, though being merely an expansion of the details of Mr, Price's scheme by Major H. S. Palmer, R.E., with the superaddition of some recommendations concerning astronomical observations to be taken, not only omitted all mention of Mr. Price, but gave the credit of the scheme to Sir J. Pope Hennessy. Nevertheless the construction of the Observatory was left to the next administration, though Major Palmer took great pains in making stellar observations (published in the Gazette of March 4, 1882), by means of which he determined the site of the Observatory to be in Lat. 22 degr. 18 min. 11.91 sec. North.

Statistics of crime, and theories as to the best treatment of Chinese criminals, were a very prominent topic of debate in Council and in the public press during this period. Sir John arrived in the Colony with the determination to apply to the