The Conference for Maritime Meteorology

Abstract

THE Conference, held at the Meteorological Office, 116, Victoria Street, for the purpose of reconsidering the decisions regarding maritime meteorology made at the Brussels Conference in 1853, has concluded its sittings, and the Report of its proceedings will be presented to the Permanent Committee, appointed by the Meteorological Congress of Vienna (of 1873), which holds its meeting at Utrecht in the course of the present week. The Conference consisted of twenty-five members, belonging respectively to every maritime country of consequence in Europe, except Sweden and Turkey. India and China were also represented. Prof. Buys Ballot was elected president, and Capt. Hoffmeyer and Mr. Scott, F.R.S., secretaries. It met on the 31st ult., and at once subdivided itself into two sub-committees, dealing with the various questions connected with (1) “Observations,” and (2) “Discussions.” Each sub-committee held four sittings, and at the closing meeting of the Conference the several resolutions framed by the sub-committees were adopted, in most cases unanimously. Inasmuch as the Conference was an outcome of the Vienna Congress, these resolutions will not be published until they have been communicated to the Permanent Committee as above mentioned. Their general scope is towards the attainment of greater uniformity in the methods of meteorological observation at sea, and of subsequent publication of the results. On Thursday, by kind permission of the Astronomer-Royal, the members went to Greenwich in the morning, where they were conducted over the magnetical and meteorological department by Mr. J. Glaisher, F.R.S. In the afternoon they spent some hours at Kew Observatory, where they were received by Mr. Jeffery, the superintendent, and in the evening the whole party was entertained at dinner at the Star and Garter, by some of the members of the Meteorological Committee. On Friday several members availed themselves of the great courtesy of the War Office, and repaired to Woolwich, where they were conducted over the Arsenal by Colonel Field and other officers connected with that department, Finally, on Saturday, they inspected the Meteorological Office, where the meetings of the Conference had been held, and paid special attention to the arrangements there existing for reproducing the records of the photographic and other instruments at the several observatories in the United Kingdom.