convey the party to some island to be decided on in the South Seas, and several gentlemen were suggested as observers, Mr. Maskelyne, President of the Society, especially recommending Mr. Dalrymple as “a proper person to send to the South Seas, having a particular turn for discoveries, and being an able navigator and well skilled in observation.”  Mr. Maskelyne estimated the voyage would take about two years, and that a sum of ten shillings and six pence per day would be a reasonable allowance for expenses, together with a gratuity the amount of which was to be settled hereafter.  A Memorial on the subject was prepared and forwarded to the King, setting forth that as a Transit of Venus over the Sun’s disc was expected to occur, and that other nations were intending to take observations thereof in the interests of navigation, it would be desirable that as the British Nation had been justly celebrated for its knowledge of Astronomy, and an Englishman, Mr. Jeremiah Horrox, had been the first person who calculated the passage of the planet over the sun, in 1639, the Government should support the Royal Society in its attempt to take a proper position in the matter, by a grant of money and a ship to take a party to the South Seas.  Four thousand pounds was the sum named, and on 24th March the President was able to inform the Council that the King had been pleased to order that it should be placed in his hands, “clear of fees,” for the purpose of defraying the expenses of the expedition.  In the end, after paying all accounts, there was a considerable balance left, which the King placed at the disposal of the Society, and a portion of it was expended on the bust of His Majesty, by Nollekins, now in its possession.

The gentlemen whose names had been suggested as observers were asked to appear before the Council if they were willing to accept the position, and Mr. Dalrymple wrote in reply to say there was only one part of the world where he would go to take observations, that was the South Seas, and he would only go if he had “the management of the ship intended for the service.”  Mr. Maskelyne told the Council he had recommended Mr. Dalrymple to the Admiralty for the command of the ship, the use of which had been granted, but had been informed that such an appointment would be “entirely repugnant to the regulations of the Navy.”  It is said that Sir Edward Hawke, having in his mind the disastrous result of giving Halley the command of a King’s ship in 1698, when a serious mutiny occurred, positively refused to sign such a commission, saying that he would “rather cut off his right hand than permit any one but a King’s officer to command one of the ships of His Majesty’s Navy.”