Page:Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Vol 4.djvu/114

Rh this year adjudged for his magnetical researches, my cotemporary and fellow student at Gottingen, has instituted a system of simultaneous observations on the periodical and irregular movements of the mag- netic needle at various stations in different parts of Europe, which suggest conclusions of the most surprising and interesting nature ; these can only be fully w^orked out and confirmed by the adoption of a similar system of observations in places extremely remote from each other on the surface of the globe. The researches on the tides, which have been so laboriously and so successfully prosecuted by Professor Whewell and Mr. Lubbock, have led, and can lead to few general and certain conclusions without the aid of labours of this nature ; and a memorable exemplification of their value, even when given in their rudest and least perfect form*, is presented in the discovery of the " Law of Storms," which Col. Reid has recently published, and which promises results so important to the interests of navigation and the cause of humanity. In the science of Mete- orology, which still remains destitute even of approximations to ge- neral laws, it is to a well-organized system of simultaneous observa- tions that we must look for the acquisition of such a knowledge of the range and character of atmospheric influences and changes, as may become the basis of a well-compacted and consistent theory, and rescue this science from the reproach, under which it has too long and too justly laboured, of presenting little more than a con- fused mass of almost entirely insulated results. Undertakings, how- ever, of this extensive and laborious nature are far beyond the reach of individual enterprize, and can only be accomplished by national aid and co-operation.

We have lately witnessed an example v>-here the Storthing, or National Assembly of Norway, a body composed partly of peasants, and representing one of the poorest countries in Europe, undertook the charge of a magnetical expedition to Siberia, on the recom- mendation and under the direction of their distinguished countiy- man, M. Hansteen, at the same time that they refused a grant of money to aid in building a palace for their sovereign ; and I feel confident that the united wishes of men of science in this and other countries, whose influence on public opinion is becoming daily more and more manifest, particularly when expressed in favour of purely scientific objects which cannot be effected without the as- sistance and the resources of the nation, will not be without their effect on the Government of our own country, which has always taken the lead in the promotion of geographical as well as scientific investigations and discoveries, and which possesses, beyond any other nation, advantages for their prosecution and accomplishment, not merely from its superior wealth, but from the range and distribution of its commerce and its colonies in every region of the globe.

There is one other event to which 1 wish to advert previously to concluding this portion of my address to you, and which I conceive I may do with the strictest propriety, as it is closely connected with


 * From the logs of ships.