It will be in the recollection of a good many who are present that in the year 1877 I visited America, in conjunction with Mr. H.C. Fischer, the Controller of our Central Telegraph Station, to officially inspect and report upon the telegraph arrangements of that country; and on the 9th February, 1878, I had the pleasure of communicating to the members of this Society my experiences of that visit. During the present year my visit was not an official one; I went for a holiday, and specially to accompany the members of the British Association, who, for the first time in the history of that association, held a meeting outside the limits of the United Kingdom. We sailed from Liverpool in a splendid steamship called the Parisian. There were nearly 200 B.A. members on board; and notwithstanding the fact that rude Boreas tried all he could to prevent us from reaching the other side of the Atlantic; notwithstanding the fact that the Atlantic expressed its anger in the most unmistakable terms at our audacity in turning from our native shore; notwithstanding the fact that Greenland's icy mountains blew chilly blasts upon us, and made us call out all the warm things we possessed--I say notwithstanding all this, we reached the Gulf of St. Lawrence in safety, and I do not think that a merrier or a happier crew ever crossed the Atlantic. There is one very interesting fact that is not generally known, and I certainly was unaware of it before I started, in connection with this particular route across the Atlantic, and that is, that by it the ship passes within only 200 miles of Greenland. The great circle that directs the shortest route from the north of Ireland to the Straits of Belle Isle passes within the cold region, and hence, while you were all sweltering in heat in London, we were compelled to bring out our ulsters and all our warm garments, to enable us to cross with any degree of comfort. The advantage of this particular route is supposed to be the fact that only five days are spent upon the ocean, and the remainder of the voyage is occupied in the calms and comforts of the Gulf and River St. Lawrence. But I am inclined to think that the roughness of the ocean and the coolness of the weather at all seasons are quite sufficient to prevent anybody from repeating our experience.