There being no objection, the report was adopted.

The PRESIDENT.  In the regular order of business to-day, the first subject before the Conference is the resolution offered on Saturday by the Delegate of the United States, Mr. RUTHERFURD, with the amendment offered by the Delegate of Sweden, Count LEWENHAUPT.

The resolution is as follows: 

“Resolved, That this universal day is to be a mean solar day, is to begin for all the world at the moment of mean midnight of the initial meridian coinciding with the beginning of the civil day and date of that meridian, and is to be counted from zero up to twenty-four hours.”

The amendment offered is as follows: 

“The Conference recommends as initial point for the universal hour and the cosmic day the mean mid-day of Greenwich, coinciding with the moment of midnight or the beginning of the civil day at the meridian 12 hours or 180 deg. from Greenwich.

     “The universal hours are to be counted from 0 up to 24
     hours.”

Mr. VALERA, the Delegate of Spain, said that he thought that the amendment of the Delegate of Sweden should be first discussed.

Mr. JANSSEN, the Delegate of France.  At the last session I informed the Congress that I had received a telegram from Sir William Thomson upon the question of the meridian.  Since then, that illustrious foreign member of the Institute of France has written me a very kind letter upon the subject, in which he expresses his complete appreciation of the disinterested attitude taken by France in this Congress.  I thank Sir William Thomson for his sentiments towards France, and I am persuaded that, with such excellent feelings, we should arrive at an understanding, upon scientific bases, in which the moral and material interests of all would be equitably adjusted, as we have always understood them.

But the question is not open now, and this Congress would, doubtless, not be disposed to reopen it.  Sir William Thomson will understand, therefore, that in the present condition of affairs we have only to maintain the attitude which we have taken and the votes which we have given.

The PRESIDENT.  The Chair will simply say to the Conference that he very informally alluded to the letter that he had received from Sir William Thomson, and the Chair would also say in answer to the Spanish Minister that the rule in this Conference, a simple one, is to discuss the last amendment offered and dispose of it, instead, as suggested by the Delegate of Spain, of taking up the one most important in its character.  It would be somewhat difficult for the Chair to decide on all occasions which amendment is the most important.  I think, therefore, as Chairman, that I will pursue the rule in force in this country, and, unless the Conference order otherwise, shall present the amendment which is the last offered.

Mr. RUIZ DEL ARBOL, Delegate of Spain.  Mr. Chairman, the Spanish Minister has not referred to the most important amendment, but to the most radical.  For instance, here there are several propositions to select a meridian; one of them must be considered, and it seems to me that my amendment, which is the most radical, is the one to be first presented to the Conference.