ht consider it expedient to
discuss. [Amongst the names of the persons composing this Committee,
which was proposed by Mr. South, were those of Dr. Wollaston and
Mr. Herschel.] The Council received their report at the close of the
session; and in recording it on the journals, they made an appeal to the
Council for the ensuing year to bestow on it "THEIR EARLIEST AND MOST
SERIOUS ATTENTION."

Now when the party, to whose government some of these improvements would
have been a death-warrant, found that the subject was likely to be taken
up in the Council, they were in dismay: but the learned and grateful
peer came to their assistance, and aided Mr. Davies Gilbert in getting
rid of these improvements completely.

It has been the fashion to maintain that all classes of the Royal
Society should be represented in the Council, and consequently that a
peer or two should find a place amongst them. Those who are most adverse
to this doctrine would perhaps be the most anxious to render this
tribute to any one really employing his time, his talents, or his rank
in advancing the cause of science. But when a nobleman, unversed in our
pursuits, will condescend to use the influence of his station in aiding
a President to stifle, WITHOUT DISCUSSION, propositions recommended
for consideration by some of the most highly gifted members of the
Society,--those who doubt the propriety of the principle may reasonably
be pardoned for the disgust they must necessarily entertain for the
practical abuse to which it leads.

Of the other three Commissioners, who received each a hundred a-year,
although the nomination was, in point of form, in the Admiralty, yet
it was well known that the President of the Royal Society did, in fact,
always name them. Of these I will only mention one fact. The late Sir
Joseph Banks assigned to me as a reason why I need not expect to be
appointed, (as he had held out to me at a former period when I had
spoken to him on the subject) that I had taken a prominent part in the
formation of the ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY. I am proud of the part I did take
in establishing that Society, although an undue share of its honour was
assigned to me by the President.

It may, perhaps, be inquired, why I publish this fact at this distance
of time? I answer, that I stated it publicly at the Council of the
Astronomical Society;--that I always talked of it publicly and openly at
the time;--that I purposely communicated it to each succeedin