Page:Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Vol 69.djvu/226

210 Department at Batavia, with reference to a possible site for a camp at or near Solok (a station about 40 miles inland on the State Railway), or still further eastwards near the Oembilien coalfields ; for it seemed that a station on the east side of the Barisan Mountains would be more likely to have favourable conditions of weather -in May than stations on the west side, an opinion based on careful study of both Dr. van der Stok's large work on 'Wind, Weather, &c., in the Indian Archipelago ' (Batavia, 1897), and also of the summary published by the Dutch Indies Scientific Society over the names of Major Muller and Dr. Figee, for the information of observers. I may say at once that the reality proved that this opinion, based on averages, was not worth much, for the local conditions seemed, at any rate in 1901, to play a comparatively small part in the determination of weather.

The route chosen for getting to Sumatra was that via Genoa, and thence by Dutch Royal Mail steamship vid Red Sea direct to Padang, and we are indebted to the Nederland Steamship Company for con- siderable reduction in fares in consideration of the scientific object of the journey. Mr. Dyson and I and my wife left Charing Cross on March 12, and travelled across the Continent together, and were joined at Genoa by Mr. J. J. Atkinson, who had generously volunteered to go with the expedition to Sumatra to assist in the observations and preparations, as he had done in the previous year with the Astronomer Royal's party in Portugal. We went on board the Dutch mail-steamer " Koningin Regentes," and sailed from Genoa on March 14. The advantages of the route were that it took us in the shortest possible time direct to our port, Padang, lying on the track of the moon's shadow, and gave us the opportunity of making the acquaintance of the Dutch astronomers, who, as we had learnt from Professor Bakhuysen, the President of the Committee charged with organising the Dutch expedition, were going out on the " Koningin Regentes "; and, further- more, as the boat called at Southampton, it was possible to take the instruments, huts, &c., on the same boat as we ourselves travelled by, without transhipment.

Mr. Dyson and I had seen to sending our cases to Southampton, and had personally put some of the more delicate instruments on board the " Koningin Regentes " on March 4. The large 4-prism spectrograph, which I was to use at the eclipse, was kept in use at Cambridge for observations of the Nova Persei until the day of my departure from Cambridge, March 11, when it was dismounted and packed; it was then taken across the Continent, and put on board the " Koningin Regentes " at Genoa. The Dutch observers, Professor W. H. Julius, Professor A. A. Nyland, and Mr. Wilterdinck, also joined the boat at Genoa, as well as a party from the Massachussetts Institute of Tech- nology, Boston, consisting of Professor A. E. Burton, Professor Hosmer, Professor Harrison W. Smith, and Mr. Matthes.