Page:History of the Royal Astronomical Society (1923).djvu/119

 1840-50] ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY 97 tigation is as finished, cool, and judicious as a studied report on things wholly remote from the writer. There is not a phrase of complaint, bitterness, or regret. There is hardly a personal word at all, except one generous passage conceding the whole glory to Le Verrier. By the energy of Stratford, who was Superintendent of the Nautical Almanac, this powerful memoir was immediately printed and issued as Appendix to the Nautical Almanac of 1851, and was thus circulated over the whole world early in January of 1847, before the Council met to settle the award of the Medal. Copies were also circulated by Schumacher with an issue of Astronomische Nachrichten. The Medal Hitherto the Society had been, first innocent of the whole affair, then an astonished and excited auditor. Now it had to mark its own judgment upon it. When one is suddenly precipi- tated before an insoluble problem or into a hopelessly embarrassed situation, what can one do except talk about it ? By the Rules, names proposed for the Medal were submitted at the November meeting and the recipient selected in January. It was decided to propose every name that might conceivably come before the Council. Airy accordingly proposed Le Verrier, Adams, and Challis, thereby contriving to walk down both sides and the middle of the road to show his impartiality. Galle, Argelander, and Hencke were also proposed. Before the January meeting, Adams's memoir was in the hands of the Council, and Le Verrier's name, coming up for a confirmatory vote, failed to receive the three-to-one majority which the Bye-laws required. " It seems to have been thought by several that an award to M. Le Verrier, unaccompanied by another to Mr. Adams, would be drawing a greater distinction between the two than fairly represents the proper inference from facts, and would be an injustice to the latter." Therefore no award was made. " Perhaps there is not one among the Council who does not, more or less, censure the collective body to which he belongs for not adopting a positive course ; while perhaps there are very few indeed who could agree upon any one mode of proceeding." The same Report contains some interesting remarks upon the responsibility of the Council, and the delegation of powers of action to it by the Society. Such a delegation is in fact and practice almost complete, and much greater than the Bye-laws assert. A possible solution considered by the Council was to recommend the General Meeting to suspend the existing Bye-law which required that not more than one Medal should be awarded in any year. In effect this would have been an invitation to the meeting to decide the disputed award. It was contended that " the spirit of the laws would be violated, to the introduction of every disadvantage which those laws were intended to avoid, if 7