Page:Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Vol 4.djvu/279

Rh the assistance of observations made at the same instant of time, and on the same system as our own. I have the satisfaction to state, that these observatories exceed forty in number.

While these researches are being made by our own and other states, private enterprise is not idle. Mr. Enderby, to whom geography is already indebted, has sent out a vessel for the purposes of discovery in the Antarctic seas, with the object of approaching as near as may be to the Southern pole. His ship is navigated by Mr. Mapleton, an officer who had been selected by Her Majesty's Government to take a part in Captain Ross's expedition ; but he had not returned to England before that expedition had sailed. We may well hope that he will merit this double confidence, and that he will, if his life be spared, add another wreath to the laurels of England, won by a Parry and a Ross, a Cooke and a Vancouver.

You are aware. Gentlemen, that previously to the departure of the late expedition, the Council of the Royal Society was requested by the government to draw up a statement of the most desirable objects in science to which the attention of the officers employed might be directed. With this request, as you might also know, the Council immediately complied ; and in the execution of the duty thus de- volved on us, the assistance of the Scientific Committees was our principal means of success. Since that time it has occurred to us, that the same recommendations, in rather a different shape, might be of great use to other scientific travellers. We have accordingly taken considerable pains in perfecting these suggestions, which we have caused to be printed for the public in general. We have already furnished copies to the Commander of the Expedition to the Niger, and I hope that, in addition to his higher objects, he may be enabled to promote our acquaintance ^vith the details of the geo- graphy and natural history of those imperfectly known parts of the globe,

I have the satisfaction to inform you, that by desire of the Council Mr. Shuckard has completed a Catalogue of the valuable manuscript letters in our library, among which are many from Ray, Willoughby, Newton, Boyle, Hook, and other eminent men, which we trust may serve as a useful aid to those Fellows who may wish to consult do- cuments of so much interest and value.

You will also be glad to know that Mr, Halliwell, one of our Fellows, has undertaken and executed the task of making a cata- logue of the miscellaneous manuscripts in our library ; a labour for which I am sure you will feel much indebted to the author. In this collection the Society possesses one most valuable manuscript, the Principia in the hand-writing of the immortal Newton.

The Royal Society, Gentlemen, was founded for the advancement of natural knowledge, not for any purposes of private advantage or vain glory. It must, therefore, always hail the foundation and prosperity of new bodies of scientific men, brought together by the same object in particular branches of science, either in the abstract, or connected with important arts and manufactures. It cannot but rejoice, thereforCj at the continued prosperity of the British Associ-