| 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 Bateson; William Thomas Blanford; Hugh Longbourne Callendar; Francis Darwin; Harold Bailey Dixon; George Carey Foster; Sir Michael Foster (Secretary); John Wesley Judd; Alfred Bray Kempe (Treasurer); Joseph Larmor (Secretary); Lord Lister; George Downing Liveing; Augustus Edward Hough Love; Henry Alexander Miers; Edward Albert Schafer; Thomas Edward Thorpe (Foreign Secretary); Thomas Henry Tizard; Herbert Hall Turner; Sir John Wolfe Barry; the President, Sir William Huggins, in the chair.
Among matters discussed or noted:
[not numbered]. New members of Council subscribed to the declaration in lieu of the oath.
1. Minutes of the two previous meetings read and approved.
2. Appointment of Vice-Presidents.
3. Death of Professor Wislicenus, Professor Percy F. Frankland asked to write the Obituary Notice.
4. Letter from John Lubbock, Lord Avebury, High Elms, Farnborough, Kent, 4 December 1902, to the President of the Royal Society, full text entered into the minutes: on the needd for science to to receive a greater share of 'the main prizes' and the need for science and modern languages in public schools and as a condition in the award of degrees. Referrred to the representatives of the Royal Society on the governing bodies of public schools.
5. Salary of Mr. Harrison, the Assistant Secretary, to be increased to £100 per annum.
6. President invited the Assistant Secretary to attend the rest of the meeting to take minutes.
7. Appointment of committees for the following year, with Chairs and lists of members: the Malaria and Tsetse Fly Committees to be amalgamated. Library Committee; Soiree Committee; House Committee; Catalogue of Scientific Papers Committee; Challenger Committee; Scientific Relief Committee; Joint Permanent Eclipse Committee; Coral Reef Committee; Malaria and Tsetse Fly Committee; Evolution Committee; Government Grant Committee; Observatories Committee; Finance Committee; Indian Government Botanical Advisory Committee; Joint Antarctic Committee; Mackinnon Bequest Committee; International Exploration of the Sea Committee; International Association of Academies Committee; Volcanoes Committee; Seismological Committee. Sectional Committees, with dates of retirement: Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry, Geology, Botany, Zoology, and Physiology. Government Grant Boards A-G.
8. Appointments to the General Board and Executive Committee of the National Physical Laboratory, with retirements.
9. Report of the Meteorological Council tabled, and to be forwarded to the Treasury.
10. Letter from the Meteorological Office, relating to a proposed new Magnetical Observatory associated with the National Physical Laboratory: a committee appointed to confer on its organisation and co-ordination between the National Physical Laboratory and the Meteorological Council.
11. Correspondence relating to the International Association of Aeronautics. With a draft letter from Michael Foster, 12 December 1902, to the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, full text entered into the minutes: on the investigation of the upper atmosphere and the need for Treasury support if research is to proceed.
12. Letter from R. Strachey, Meteorological Office, 63 Victoria Street, 6 November 1902, to Sir William Huggins, full text entered into the minutes: on the administration of the grant to the Meteorological Council and the Fort William Observatory, anticipating the Royal Society's support in a full enquiry into the workings of the Office and the requirements of a national system of meteorological observations.
13. Letter from the Foreign Office relaying a French Government request for information on the loan of books and manuscripts from U.K. Libraries: the Foreign Office to be informed that the Society was prepared to lend items with precautions, each application to be considered on its merits, and no loan was to be made without the specific authority of Council.
14. Report of the Library Committee, including on journal exchanges and on the overcrowded state of the bookshelves: the need a reprinted catalogue of serials and for more shelf space to be considerd by a committee reporting to the Library Committee.
15. Revision of the statement on the reverse of Candidates' certificates necessitating an amendment to Statutes.
16. Royal Society delegates to the 5th International Congress of Applied Chemistry selected, to form a committee with others from learned soieties in Great Britain.
17. Professor Klement A. Timirjazev to be invited to deliver the Croonian Lecture.
18. Treasurer noted small balances accumulating in the Croonian Fund account: these to be used to meet expenses, but in future years the whole income is to be given to the Croonian Lecturer.
19. The Physics and Chemistry Sectional Committee to be invites to suggest a lecturer and subject for the Bakerian Lecture.
20. Resolution on empowering the Joint Antarctic Committee to transfer expenses between funds.
21. Application of Dr. Edridge Green for a grant of £10 in aid of 'discovering some method of fixing the visual purple': £5 allocated from the Reserve Fund on the approval of the Chairman of Government Grant Board G.
22. Letter from Mr. Borchgrevink asking if the Royal Society would co-operate in organising an Antarctic expedition to the south of Cape Horn: the reply that the Society could not take any responsibility for such an expedition.
23. Letter from Lord Reay, President of the British Academy, 6 Great Stanhope Street, 1 December 1902, to Sir Michael Foster, full text entered into the minutes: on the admission of the British Academy to the International Association of Academies.
24. Seal of the Royal Society affixed to Foreign Member diplomas.
25. Report of the Joint Permanent Eclipse Committee, including a list of committee members and proposals on observing the 1905 eclipse.
26. £2,000 received from the Treasury for National Physical Laboratory salary and expenses.
27. Revision of duties and wages of Royal Society staff in consequence of the retirement of Mr. Chapman.
28. Leave granted to the military attache of the American Embassy to reproduce Professor Forbes' paper on a portable range-finder.
29. Bills for paper, engraving and other expenses. |