be furnished at cost to any one who wished for them. As an
example of their use, suppose that an astronomer at a little German
University should discover a law regulating the stars in clusters.
Perhaps he has only a small telescope, near the smoke and haze of a
large city, and has no means of securing the photographs he needs. He
would apply to the committee, and they would vote that ten photographs
of twenty clusters, each with an exposure of an hour, should be taken
with the large telescope. This would occupy about a tenth part of the
time of the telescope for a year. After making copies, the photographs
would be sent to the astronomer who would perhaps spend ten years in
studying and measuring them. The committee would have funds at their
disposal to furnish him, if necessary, with suitable measuring
instruments, assistants for reducing the results, and means for
publication. They would thus obtain the services of the most skilful
living astronomers, each in his own special line of work, and the latter
would obtain in their own homes material for study, the best that the
world could supply. Undoubtedly, by such a combination if properly
organized, results could be obtained far better than is now possible by
the best individual work, and at a relatively small expense. Many years
of preparation will evidently be needed to carry out such a plan, and to
save time we have taken the first step and have sent a skilful and
experienced observer to South Africa to study its climate and compare it
with the experience he has gained during the last twenty years from a
similar study of the climate of South America and the western portion of
the United States.

The next question to be considered is in what direction we may expect
the greatest advance in astronomy will be made. Fortunate indeed would
be the astronomer who could answer this question correctly. When Ptolemy
made the first catalogue of the stars, he little expected that his
observations would have any value nearly two thousand years later. The
alchemists had no reason to doubt that their results were as important
as those of the chemists. The astrologers were respected as much as the
astronomers. Although there is a certain amount of fashion in astronomy,
yet perhaps the best test is the judgment of those who have devoted
their lives to that science. Thirty years ago the field was narrow. It
was the era of big telescopes. Every astronomer wanted a larger
telescope tha