10, DOWNING STREET, WHITEHALL,
June 6, 1881.

DEAR SIR GEORGE AIRY,

I cannot receive the announcement of your resignation, which you have just conveyed to me, without expressing my strong sense of the distinction you have conferred upon the office of Astronomer Royal, and of the difficulty of supplying your place with a person of equal eminence.  Let me add the expression of my best wishes for the full enjoyment of your retirement from responsibility.

I remain, dear Sir George Airy,
Faithfully yours,
W.E.  GLADSTONE.

* * * * *

ADMIRALTY,
June 10th, 1881.

SIR,

I am commanded by my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 4th instant, intimating your desire to retire on the 15th August next from the office of Astronomer Royal.

2.  In reply I am to acquaint you that your wishes in this matter have been communicated to the Prime Minister, and that the further necessary official intimation will in due course be made to the Treasury.

3.  At the same time I am instructed by their Lordships to convey to you the expression of their high appreciation of the remarkably able and gifted manner, combined with unwearied diligence and devotion to the Public Service (especially as regards the Department of the State over which they preside), in which you have performed the duties of Astronomer Royal throughout the long period of forty-five years.

4.  I am further to add that their Lordships cannot allow the present opportunity to pass without giving expression to their sense of the loss which the Public Service must sustain by your retirement, and to the hope that you may long enjoy the rest to which you are so justly entitled.

I am, Sir,
Your obedient Servant,
ROBERT HALL.

Sir G. B. Airy, K.C.B.
  &c., &c.,
    Royal Observatory, Greenwich.

* * * * *

ADMIRALTY,
28th June, 1881.

SIR,

My Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty have much pleasure in transmitting copy of a resolution passed by the Board of Visitors of the Royal Observatory on the 4th June last, bearing testimony to the valuable services you have rendered to Astronomy, to Navigation, and the allied Sciences throughout the long period during which you have presided over the Royal Observatory.

I am, Sir,
Your obedient Servant,
ROBERT HALL.

Sir George Biddell Airy, K.C.B.
  &c., &c., &c.,
    Royal Observatory, Greenwich.

“The Astronomer Royal (Sir George B. Airy) having announced his intention of shortly retiring from his position at the Royal Observatory, the following resolution proposed by Professor J. C. Adams, and seconded by Professor G. G. Stokes, was then unanimously adopted and ordered to be recorded in the Minutes of the Proceedings.