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NOTES AND Q UERIES. [ii s. vi. SEPT. 28, 1912.
previously been in the habit of meeting for the
purpose of communicating with each other on
subjects of common interest, assembled in
Gresham College, and. agreed to form themselves
into a Society having for its object the promoting
of physico-mathematical experimental learning.
When they assembled in the following week, it
was reported to them that what they proposed
was highly approved by the reigning monarch,
who intimated at the same time his desire to do
what lay in his power towards promoting so
useful an undertaking."
On Monday, the 1st of December, 1873, the Society celebrated its first anniversary in Burlington House, when the retiring President, Sir George Airy, congratulated the Society on the " scientific, literary, and social accommodation they now enjoy ' ' in their new " localization," and expressed his hope that they were there established with & degree of permanency at least comparable to that which the Society experienced in Crane Court and in Somerset House.
As a mark of the progress of events, it may be noted that in December, 1881, the meeting-room and the approaches thereto were for the first time lighted by electricity.
No account of the Society would be complete without reference to its library .and varied collections. First of all, as previously noted, there was the princely gift of the library of Arundel House, the conditions of the presentation showing that the stability of the Society had not then become assured :
" In case the Society should come to fail, it was desired that the collection should be returned to Arundel House, and in each of the books, which numbered 2,500, was to be placed this inscription : ' Ex dono Henrici Howard Nor- folciensis.' "
In addition to the books, there were 570 MSS. Some of these were reputed to have come from the famous library which King Mathias Corvinus had formed at Buda- pest, passing thence in later years into the possession of Bilibald Pirckheimer of Nurem- berg, and many of the books still in the Society's possession contain his book-plate. In the first catalogue, compiled by William Percy and published in 1681, the Arundel Collection and other gifts were kept separate, but now they are all merged. On June 20th, 1872, the Library Committee resolved to dispose of superfluous books, including many in the Norfolk collections ; and in 1883 the most valuable of the books of purely literary interest retained by the Society were brought together, and a large number of them appropriately re- D ound ; they are now kept under lock an d key in a dustproof case. Among
these, to name a few, are a Caxton dhaucer
(1484 ?) ; a Second Folio Shakespeare ;
two volumes from the press of Fust &
Schoeffer, printed on vellum and finely
illuminated ; an editio princeps of Euclid
(1482); the Nuremberg Chronicle (1493);
editiones principes of the Latin Classics ;
many Aldines ; and a large collection of
Luther's and other Reformation tracts.
Donors have been so generous that the
scientific books now number 100,000.
There is also a rich collection of early scientific correspondence, official records, and other manuscripts. These include the original MS., with Newton's corrections, from which the first edition of the ' Prin- cipia ' was printed ; the MS. volume of the ' Commercium Epistolicum ' relating to the Leibnitz-Newton controversy on the invention of the method of fluxions ; a collection of Newtoniana in six great volumes, presented by the Rev. Charles Tumour ; and letters of Priestley and many others. A series of guard-books, which have been carefully catalogued by Sir Arthur Church, contain documents dating from the grant of the charter. The enor- mous labour Sir Arthur has bestowed upon this may be judged from the fact that one of the sets consists of thirty - nine volumes. In addition, there is the collec- tion of Boyle papers, bound in fifty- three volumes. All the manuscripts in the archives are available for consultation by Fellows of the Society and persons duly introduced under conditions provided by statute.
The instruments and historical relics comprise the solar dial cut in stone, made by Sir Isaac Newton when a boy ; an original telescope made by him ; an air-pump, with double barrel, presented by Boyle in 1662 ; Sir William Petty's double-bottomed boat ; Huygens's aerial telescope ; two chrono- meters by Arnold which accompanied Capt. Cook on his second and third voyages ; and Dr. Priestley's electrical machine.
The portraits, which number over a hundred, include Charles II., Bacon, Boyle, Copernicus, Sir Humphry Davy, Evelyn, Faraday, Benjamin Franklin, Galileo, Halley, Harvey, Hobbes of Malmesbury, Kelvin, John Locke, Leibnitz, Newton, Pepys, Smeaton, and Wheatstone.
From the beginning of its history the scientific work has been carried on by means of committees divided into the following sections : 1. Mathematics ; 2. Physics and Chemistry ; 3. Geology ; 4. Botany ; 5. Zoology ; 6. Physiology. In
