| Description | Printed minutes containing matters laid before Council, the Royal Society's governing body of Fellows, with records of decisions taken.
Commencing with a list of Council members present: Dr. John Bostock; William Bowman; Sir William Burnett; Samuel Hunter Christie; John Frederic Daniell; Thomas Graham; Roderick Murchison; Peter Mark Roget; Dr. John Forbes Royle; Dr. William Sharpey; John Taylor; John Wrottesley. 2nd Baron Wrottesley; the President, Spencer Joshua Alwyn Compton, 2nd Marquess of Northampton, in the chair.
Among matters discussed or noted: minutes of the last meeting were read and confirmed. New members of Council made and signed the declaration in lieu of the oath. Appointment of Vice-Presidents. Reappointment of committees, with lists of members: Library Committee; Committee of Mathematics; Committee of Astronomy; Committee of Physics, including Meteorology; Committee of Chemistry; Committee of Mineralogy and Geology; Committee of Botany and Vegetable Physiology; Committee of Zoology and Animal Physiology; each to be summoned as early as convenient for the election of Chairmen. Letter from Sir John Barrow, Admiralty, 11 December 1844, to the Marquess of Northampton, full text entered into the minutes: enclosing his minute on the completion f the North-West Passage, approved by Lord Haddington and the Lords of the Admiralty; full text of Barrow's 'Proposal for an attempt to complete the discovery of a North-West Passage'; resolved that an expedition would materially increase knowledge of geography and terrestrial magnetism and that the President should communicate this to H.M. Government. Letter from George Bidell Airy, Royal Observatory, Greenwich, 11 December 1844, to Samuel Hunter Christie, full text entered into the minutes: he has examined the manuscript book in the Society's apartments, finding it to be a catalogue of instruments at Greenwich used by annual Visitors to the Observatory, and asks that it be transferred to the Royal Observatory, request granted. resolved that curtains be ordered for the Council Room and Ante-Room. Mr. Turnor's letter on the Newton sun-dial presented to the Society ordered to be printed in Philosophical Transactions. Resolved that the Treasurer invest £1,000 in consols. |