| 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: Sir George Back; the Reverend John Barlow; Thomas Bell; Edward Frankland; John Peter Gassiot; Philip Hardwick; William Hallows Miller; Sir Roderick Impey Murchison; John Percy; Major-General Edward Sabine; William Sharpey; Archibald Smith; George Gabriel Stokes; Charles Wheatstone; the Reverend William Whewell; the President, Benjamin Collins Brodie in the Chair.
Among matters discussed or noted: minutes of the last meeting read and approved. The seal of the Royal Society was affixed to a power of attorney, enabling the solicitors to receive the accumulations arising from the Stevenson bequest. Mr. Stokes communicated a report which had been presented to the Registar-General on the calculating machine used by the General Register Office. Letter from George Graham, Registrar-General, General Register Office, Somerset House, 5 September 1859, to the Secretary, the Royal Society, Burlington House, full text entered into the minutes: expressing thanks for the Society's assistance and stating his confidence in reporting to the Treasury that Mr. Donkin's work on the second calculating machine was satisfactory. Reported that the President had given permission for the Rifle Corps to use the courtyard and gardens at Burlington House for drill practice. Letter from George Clerk, India Office, 17 October 1859, to Charles Richard Weld, full text entered into the minutes: Major-General Boileau has requested the forwarding of papers received from India to the Royal Society, suggesting the publication of abstracts of magnetic and meteorological observations taken at Simla, Madras [Chennai] and Singapore 1841-1845; but first, Sir Charles Wood wishes to know the value of the proposed publication; the letter referred to the Treasurer. Letter from Dr. Robinson stating that the Armagh Observatory publication, printed with £350 from the Government Grant, was complete and submitting a list of institutions and individuals to whom copies might be presented: the list approved, with the recommendaton that he present copies in the name of the Royal Society, H.M. Government, and that a small number of copies might be placed at his disposal for private distribution. Philosophical Transactions and Proceedings to be supplied to Silliman's Journal. Society of Naturalists of New Grenada and Dublin University Zoological and Botanical Association to receive copies of Proceedings. Dr. Buttler of Plymouth allowed his arrears of Philosophical Transactions. Mr. Bell moved his resolution on the Scientific Relief Fund: an amendment was moved by Archibald Smith, that a committee be appointed, with Mr. Gassiot, to consider how the fund might be administered, with the instruction to enquire how this might be done with the least possible intervention of Council of the Royal Society, the motion carried. |