Page:History of the Royal Astronomical Society (1923).djvu/209

 1870-80] ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY 181 Mr. Proctor followed this up by another paper to be found in the Monthly Notices for June 1869,* but the subject dropped as a matter of controversy in the Society until the year 1873. A sum of 10,500 had been sanctioned by the Treasury in 1869 May, and voted by the House of Commons at the end of the Parliamentary session of that year to defray the expenses of providing instruments and making observations of the transit, and the Astronomer Royal proceeded with the preparation for the expeditions. A further sum of 5000 was added for photography, which was undertaken at the instigation of Mr. De la Rue, the Board of Visitors of the Royal Observatory, at their meeting of 1871 June 3, having passed a resolution that a grant of 5000 ought to be made to cover the cost of photographic apparatus and observations at all the stations. Sir George Airy expressed himself guardedly as to hope of success. There was evidently a feeling in some quarters antagonistic to the official scheme. An article, apparently by Mr. Proctor, was published in the Spectator of 1873 February 8 on the subject, and on February 13, the day before the Annual General Meeting of our Society, when the stormy scene already mentioned happened, another appeared in The Times, of which Mr. Becket Denison was the avowed author, stating plainly the history of the matter and urging that sufficient attention had not been given to Mr. Proctor's papers and suggestions in planning the scheme of the observations. Mr. Proctor wrote a letter to The Times of February 20, in which he stated definitely the principal alterations that he proposed in Sir George Airy's plan. First, that one of the Antarc- tic stations it was proposed to utilise in 1882 should also be occupied in 1874, Possession Island, near Victoria Land, being the place indicated ; secondly, that the region of northern India for observ- ing the " retarded egress " of Venus had been completely overlooked in the Astronomer Royal's researches ; thirdly, that the station selected for observing the " accelerated egress " was unfortunate in many respects, especially as Possession Island, which is suitable for observing the transit by Halley's method, is also very suitable for observing the phase referred to ; and lastly, that as Lord Lindsay was equipping an expedition to observe at Mauritius, it was not necessary for a Government expedition to go to Rodriguez, which was so near, but that the cost of this might be applied in providing for the Antarctic station. The Board of Admiralty sent these papers to Sir George Airy for his opinion, and at their Lordships' request his reply was communicated to our Society, and is printed in the Monthly Notices of 1873 March. The Astro- meeting.
 * From the Astronomical Register it appears that this was read at the May