Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/346

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 s. vi. OCT. 12, 1912.

drawn and engraved by Thomas Bewick, cannot have been published before 1831, as they bear the imprint " Newcastle : Printed by C. H. Cook, Pilgrim Street," and Cook, who was Edward Walker's executor, did not take control of the printing business of The Newcastle Courant until the death of Walker, which occurred on 23 June, 1831. Probably they were printed immediately before the 1832 edition of the 'Birds,' and issued, as had been Bewick's custom, to enable purchasers of the 1826 edition to make the addition to their copies. The last of the six birds, the Cream-coloured Courser, was not shot until 15 Oct., 1827, and it must have been well on in 1828 before the blocks and descriptive matter were ready for the press. Another edition by Bewick was probably intended ; but his death in November, 1828, upset that, and no doubt R. E. Bewick decided to publish what his father had left ready, in Additamenta to his last edition as we now have them. The pagination follows that of the Addenda in the 1826 edition.

Mr. W. H. Gibson, who has the Bewick Collection in the Public Library, Newcastle - upon-Tyne, under his especial care, kindly sends me the following explanation of the tail-piece, ' The Tethered Horse Grazing, with a net over its hind quarters,' at p. 254, vol. i. of the ' Birds,' first edition, 1797 :

" Bewick was hitting at a mean man who, having paid to have his horse put to grass, was determined to get all he paid for and allow nothing to return to the land."

A piece of true Bewickian humour !

WHITE LINE.

THE ROYAL SOCIETY'S 250TH ANNIVERSARY.

(See ante, pp. 181, 202, 223, 243, 261.)

MENTION should also be made of the Society for the Improvement of Animal Chemistry, which, although it did not endure long, contributed through its members several papers of great value to the Philosophical Transactions, Weld re- lates that it was instituted in April, 1809, by

" some Fellows of the Royal Society, animated by a strong desire to advance the study of Chemistry and Physiology, with the ' well-grounded hope that if proper pains are hereafter taken to advance it, the most important discoveries will be the result.' "

At the desire of the Society it was admitted as an Assistant Society to the Royal Society. It appears to have been a kind of club, and

the members dined together at one or other's house. Among the members were- Sir Joseph Banks, Sir Everard Home, Dr. Babington, Sir Benjamin Brodie, Sir Humphry Davy, and other distinguished men.

The establishment of the Royal Astro- nomical Society in 1820 marks an epoch in the history of the Royal Society. To William Pearson the Astronomical Society owes its origin. He was born on St. George's- Day, 1767. He early manifested a love- for mechanics, and constructed machines- for exhibiting astronomical phenomena. A description of these will be found in Rees's ' Cyclopaedia.' In 1819 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, but as early as 1812, as shown by documents still in existence, he had conceived the idea of foundling an association especially de- voted to astronomy. But although the idea originated with Pearson, yet, when the time came, Francis Baily was " the- chief agent in carrying out the idea vigorously and effectively." The earliest minute-books are all in his handwriting, and he was the- first secretary, being elected at the first meeting held at the house of the Geological Society in Bedford Street, Co vent Garden,, on the 8th of February, 1820.

Sir John Herschel, who was requested" to draw up an address, which is printed in the first volume of the Society's Trans~ actions, states that

'' the science of Astronomy was so diligently cultivated by several Fellows of the Royal Society at that period [1820] as to have led to the accumulation of considerable collections of valuable observations, which, owing to the- expense of publishing, would inevitably have been lost to the scientific world, had not the Astronomical Society been established."

It was not established, however, without opposition, and the Duke of Somerset,, on being elected its first President, resigned at once when he found that Sir Joseph. Banks feared that the new Society would prove to be the ruin of the Royal Society,, of which he was then President. Banks lived only a few months after the founda- tion of the Astronomical Society : he- occupied the chair at the Royal Society for the last time on the 16th of March, 1820, and died on Monday, the 19th of June, having been President for forty-one years.

Wollaston, the discoverer of palladium (1804) and rhodium (1805), and the first to notice the dark lines in the solar spectrum,, filled the chair till the following November, when Sir Humphry Davy was elected President. He followed the example of