Thus there is amongst this class one solitary prize of at the utmost 1,300_l._ a-year, and that is confined to one department of science. Offices for which men of science are at least as fit as any other persons, are numerous, though they are very rarely attained by those who pursue it. It may, perhaps, have been expected that the recent appointment of Sir John Herschel to the Mastership of the Mint, should have been noticed in the previous list. But until the motives which dictated it are known, I have no observation to make, except that it is gratifying to me to find that the great principle of the “claims of science,” for which I have all my life been contending, has been thus as it were, unconsciously admitted by the minister: and had the accident of birth placed me in his position, the appointment would have been the same, although the motives for it might have been different. Let us now turn to the _honorary distinctions_ which await science. During the eleven years of the present reign, one solitary instance is to be found of a baronetcy given for science, and that too occurred only at a festival (the coronation) at which baronetages and peerages were showered upon those whose sole claim was founded on the mere support of party. During the same interval, about half a dozen of those who cultivate science, have been knighted. It appears then that the highest position a man of science can attain, and that but very rarely, is a baronetcy; that the highest salary is about 1,000_l._ a-year. When this is compared with the most successful prizes in the army, the navy, the church, or the bar, it shows at once the inferior position occupied by science. Connected with the navy is an office which ought to be held by a person eminently uniting science with practical skill. The Surveyor-General of the Navy has to decide upon questions of the greatest difficulty. The mathematical theories and inquiries on which the various qualities of sailing vessels and steamers depend, are of the most complicated kind, and are not even yet sufficiently advanced to serve as secure and absolute guides. Yet without a knowledge of their present state, and a power of advancing those theories, it is hopeless to expect the greatest and most valuable additions to the science of naval architecture. This can only be accomplished by one who combines a great facility in applying such portions of them as admit of it, to the practical facts which experience is continually bringing to light.