of the Sun’s radiant heat on the sea, as explaining the curve of diurnal magnetic inequality. (That diurnal inequality was inferred from the magnetic reductions 1848-1857, which were terminated in 1860.)—­Regarding the proposal of hourly time-signals on the Start Point, I consulted telegraph engineers upon the practical points, and on Dec. 21st I proposed a formal scheme, in complete detail. (The matter has been repeatedly brought before the Admiralty, but has been uniformly rejected.)—­I was engaged on the question of the bad ocular vision of two or three persons.—­The British Association Meeting was held at Manchester:  I was President of Section A. I gave a Lecture on the Eclipse of 1860 to an enormous attendance in the Free Trade Hall.”  The following record of the Lecture is extracted from Dr E.J.  Routh’s Obituary Notice of Airy written for the Proceedings of the Royal Society.  “At the meeting of the British Association at Manchester in 1861, Mr Airy delivered a Lecture on the Solar Eclipse of 1860 to an assembly of perhaps 3000 persons.  The writer remembers the great Free Trade Hall crowded to excess with an immense audience whose attention and interest, notwithstanding a weak voice, he was able to retain to the very end of the lecture....The charm of Professor Airy’s lectures lay in the clearness of his explanations.  The subjects also of his lectures were generally those to which his attention had been turned by other causes, so that he had much that was new to tell.  His manner was slightly hesitating, and he used frequent repetitions, which perhaps were necessary from the newness of the ideas.  As the lecturer proceeded, his hearers forgot these imperfections and found their whole attention rivetted to the subject matter.”

Of private history:  “On Jan. 2nd there was a most remarkable crystallization of the ice on the flooded meadows at Playford:  the frost was very severe.—­From June 20th to Aug. 1st I was at the Grange near Keswick (where I hired a house) with my wife and most of my family.—­From Nov. 5th to 14th I was on an expedition in the South of Scotland with my son Wilfrid:  we walked with our knapsacks by the Roman Road across the Cheviots to Jedburgh.—­On Dec. 21st I went to Playford.”

1862

“The Report to the Board of Visitors states that ’A new range of wooden buildings (the Magnetic Offices) is in progress at the S.S.E. extremity of the Magnetic Ground.  It will include seven rooms.’—­Also ’I took this opportunity (the relaying of the water-main) of establishing two powerful fire-plugs (one in the Front Court, and one in the Magnetic Ground); a stock of fire-hose adapted to the “Brigade-Screw” having been previously secured in the Observatory.’—­’Two wires, intended for the examination of spontaneous earth-currents, have been carried from the Magnetic Observatory to the Railway Station in the town of Greenwich.  From this point one wire is to be led to a point in the neighbourhood of Croydon, the