Page:History of the Royal Astronomical Society (1923).djvu/53

 1820-30] ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY 37 June i, 1821. SIR, I beg you will return my thanks to the President and Council of the Astronomical Society of London, for the honour they have done me in sending me the account of their proceedings, in which every lover of science must take a strong interest. I am, Sir, yr. obed. servt., H. DAVY. To F. Baily, Esq., F.R.S., S.A.S. We may take it, therefore, that the little friction of the year before was entirely at an end. The adopted regulations only differ in detail from those now in force, but one detail is important, viz. the preparation of an abstract by the Secretaries. This naturally caused delay, which was at times inconvenient : and in 1825 May revised regulations were adopted with a view of saving time. Firstly, the reading of the paper to the Society was taken as the occasion of the appointment of referees (instead of the reading of an abstract to Council) ; and secondly, if the referees and chairman were in favour of publishing the paper at once, they might proceed without waiting for a Council meeting, provided always that the matter be reported to Council at their next meeting. Otherwise the Council would ballot in the ordinary way. It is abundantly clear from the Minutes that this critical procedure was no empty formality. Thus on 1829 November 27, no less than five papers which had been read at the last meeting were rejected by the Committee and (after ballot) by the Council for printing. Any paper for the Memoirs is still subjected to ballot, and it is interesting to see how quickly our regular procedure was got into shape. It is true that most papers nowadays are printed in the Monthly Notices without ballot, but it is easy to see how a practice originally adopted for brief communications has been naturally extended, from its obvious advantages, to all but very long papers. At the outset, however, the Memoirs were the only publications of any kind (with a possible modification mentioned below). The following notes may be found convenient : Memoirs, vol. i., is published by Baldwin, Cradock & Joy, and bears on the title-page the date 1822 ; but this title was issued with Part I. of the volume (pp. 1-232). Part II. ends with the 4th Report, dated 1824 Feb. 13, and the list of officers for 1824-5 ; an d on the last page is the name of the printer (Richard Taylor, Shoe Lane). Memoirs, vol. ii., same publisher and printer ; 1826 on title- page ; ends with Baily's Presidential addresses on 1826 April 14, and a list of Fellows on 1826, June 19. But there follows as an Appendix, Baily's Catalogue of 3000 stars.