rable surprise to some of those present, to
discover afterwards that it was entered on the minutes as a resolution.
This statement I have endeavoured to verify, and I believe it to be
substantially correct; if it was a resolution, it was dictated, not
discussed. It is also important to observe, that no similar resolution
stands on the council-books for any previous year.

On examining the minutes of the succeeding Council, no notice of
the letter of Captain Beaufort to the President is found. Why was it
omitted? If the first entry had been truly made, there would have been
no necessity for the omission; and after the insertion of that letter,
a resolution would naturally have followed, recommending another name
instead of the one withdrawn. Such was the natural and open course; but
this would have exposed to the Society the weakness of those who manage
it. If the rough minutes of each meeting of the Council were read over
before it separated, and were copied previously to the next meeting,
such a substitution could hardly have occurred; but, unfortunately, this
is not the case, and the delay is in some cases considerable. Thus, the
minutes of the three Councils, held on February 4, on February 11, and
on March 11, were not entered on the minute-books of the Council
on Tuesday, the 16th March; nor was this the fault of the
Assistant-secretary, for up to that day the rough minutes of no one of
those Councils had been transmitted to him.

Deeply as every friend to the Royal Society must regret such an
occurrence, one slight advantage may accrue. Should that resolution be
ever quoted hereafter to prove that the Council of 1829 really discussed
the persons to be recommended as their successors, the detection of
this suppression of one portion of it, will furnish better means of
estimating the confidence due to the whole.

SECTION 4. OF THE SCIENTIFIC ADVISERS.

Whether it was feared by the PARTY who govern the Royal Society,
that its Council would not be sufficiently tractable, or whether the
Admiralty determined to render that body completely subservient to them,
or whether both these motives concurred, I know not; but, low as has
been for years its character for independence, and fallen as the Royal
Society is in public estimation, it could scarcely be prepared for
this last insult. In order to inform the public and the Society, (for I
believe the fact is known to few of the members,) it will be necessary
to trac