| 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; Arthur Cayley; William Farr; Sir Henry Holland; Thomas Henry Huxley; William Hallows Miller; Major-General Edward Sabine; William Sharpey; George Gabriel Stokes; Alexander William Williamson; the Reverend Robert Willis; Sir William Page Wood; John Wrottesley, 2nd Baron Wrottesley; Colonel Philip Yorke; the President, Benjamin Collins Brodie in the Chair.
Among matters discussed or noted: minutes of the last meeting read and approved. Robert Willis made and subscribed to the declaration in lieu of the oath, as a new Member of Council. The corporate seal was affixed to a power of attorney to enable Messrs. Few and Company to receive dividends from the Stevenson Bequest. The Secretary stated that a letter had been received from the Colonial Office requesting that printed rules and regulations of the Society should be sent to the Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands, where a Society to promote art, literature and science was being formed: the Secretary had sent copies of the Statutes, the list of Fellows and the letter of the French Government from 1856. Letter of the Committee of the Humboldt Foundation was considered and various motions made: £50 from the Donation Fund was contributed, the Foreign Secretary to communicate this, but the Society deemed it not expedient to invite subscriptions from the Fellowship at large. Payment of £52 4s. 6d. was ordered to complete the inclosure of land at Acton. Two guineas granted to the Parochial Schools at Mablethorpe. The President raised the issue of remuneration of Secretaries, a committee apppointed to consider the matter. On the memorial from the Stevenson family, full text of a draft reply entered into the minutes: the Stevenson Bequest was now part of the Societys general funds and no donation could be made to the Stevenson family. The Foreign Secretary noted that four vacancies had now arisen in the list of Foreign Members: resolved that a list of Foreign men of science to be formed, for selection of candidates for Foreign Membership. |