| Description | Printed minutes containing matters laid before Council, the Royal Society's governing body of Fellows, with records of decisions taken. Individual minutes are numbered.
Commencing with a list of Council members present: William Grylls Adams; Thomas Clifford Allbutt; Thomas George Bonney; John Cleland; Robert Bellamy Clifton; James Alfred Ewing; Michael Foster; Sir Edward Frankland; Alfred Bray Kempe; John Newport Langley; Joseph Larmor; Nevil Story Maskelyne; Raphael Meldola; Edward Bagnell Poulton; Arthur William Rucker; William James Russell; Dukinfield Henry Scott; Walter Frank Raphael Weldon; The Treasurer, Sir John Evans, in the chair.
Among matters discussed or noted:
1. Minutes of the last meeting read and approved.
2. Deaths of Dr Percival Frost, Lyon Lord Playfair and Mr. Osbert Salvin.
3. Appointments to committees to replace Osbert Salvin: A. B. Kempe to the Government Grant Review Committee; Dr. P. L. Sclater to the Scientific Relief Committee; Professor S. J. Hickson to the Sectional Committee for Zoology.
4. Letter from Professor Lankester contending that the form in which the Report of the Government Grant Committee was issued was incorrect, President and Council approve the form of the report.
5. Reappointment of the Government Grant Review Committee, members listed.
6. Letter from Dr. Ludwig Mond stating the desirability of bringing out the subject-index to the Catalogue of Scientific Papers as soon as possible; resolved that the index should be proceeded with and the Catalogue Committee requested to take necessary steps.
7. Report of the delegates to the cartel of German Academies, full text entered into the minutes: subjects discussed included geodesy, the International Catalogue of Scientific Literature, Antarctic Expedition, and the extension of the cartel. President and Council approve the principle of an international association of important learned societies and undertake to enter into further communication if required.
8. Letter from the Secretary of the Science and Art Department enclosing Foreign Office correspondence on an International Congress of Applied Chemistry in Vienna, asking if the Society wishes to appoint delegates; declined, the Congress considered too technical in nature.
9. Proposed two new electric railways near Kew Observatory, letter written to the Office of Works on steps to protect the Observatory.
10. Resolution of the Sectional Committee for Physics and Chemistry on the immediate publication of important discoveries; Professor Ewing's motion to allow members of the Press to attend Ordinary Meeting, discussion postponed.
11. Report of the Scientific Relief Committee: £100 to be placed with Lord Lister and £100 with Professor Thorpe, for the benefit of applicants, approved.
12. Senior Secretary reported a joint meeting of the Sectional Committees for Botany and Zoology, 13 July, to consider Murray and Blackman's paper on phytoplankton of the Atlantic; the committee to also consider George Murray's application for a grant in aid of exploration of the intermediate depths of the ocean, approved. Committees reported in common that they were unable to support the application referred by Council; resolved that Council was unwilling to make a grant of £500 from the reserve.
13. Application from Sir Martin Conway for a grant in aid of his expedition to the Andes of Bolivia, deferred.
14. Report of the Sectional Committee for Botany: the letter from Professor Jakob Eriksson on rust in wheat to be referred to the Royal Agricultural Society; application from Captain Herbert W. Dowding R.N., to explore the Llanos de Cayuan with a botanist recommended to Council.
15. Letter from the Chair of Government Grant Board D on Major Gibbons application, to be declined.
16. Application from the Secretary of the Linnean Society for a Publication Grant in favour of F. J. Cole's paper on sense organs of fishes, £50 granted.
17. Application for a grant from the Sandwich Islands Committee in aid of publication; with a resolution from the B. P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, to help in defraying costs not to exceed £500. £250 granted as an instalment from the Publication Grant, provided that the Government Grant Review Committee are satisfied with the allocation of specimens.
18. Committee of Papers recommendation for £96.10s to be allocated to three papers to be published in the Philosophical Transactions: by Dr. C. Chree, Mr. C. S. Tomes and Mr. H. M. Vernon.
19 Adjudication of Royal Society Medals: list of names submitted for consideration, to be proposed and seconded at a future meeting of Council.
20. Request of the Joint Permanent Eclipse Committee for letters of thanks to be written to the Admiralty and the Secretaries of State for the Colonies and for India, for aid in recent eclipse observations.
21. Professor W. Pfeffer allowed to borrow his original Croonian Lecture manuscript.
22. Letter of thanks and commemorative medal and volume for the committee for establishing a memorial to Malpighi.
23. Letter from the Photographic Committee of the Royal Astronomical Society asking to borrow negatives of the solar corona taken at Nova Zemlya, August 1896, granted.
24. Bills for engraving and other expenses.
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