‘Ordered,—That Mr. Coleridge’s lectures be discontinued, and that Mr. Savage make out an account of the number of lectures that Mr. Coleridge has given, in order that a proportional payment may be made.’
On June 20, 2,000l. being wanted for the payment of the tradesmen’s bills and salaries, the managers and visitors subscribed it as a loan without interest. The tradesmen were paid to December 1806.
The terms of subscription to the Institution were altered thus: Annual, four guineas; and life subscription, forty guineas; the qualification for proprietors was reduced to a hundred guineas.
The position of the Royal Institution is well seen in the following report, which the Committee of Managers made to the Committee of Visitors, on the deficiency of the income of the Institution, &c., on March 20, 1809.
They begin by stating ‘that the 700 transferable tickets of the proprietors stopped the annual income from subscribers. In January 1803 the corporation were 3,000l. in debt. A subscription was made; transferable rights were reduced one-half, so as to allow of a greater number of annual subscribers.
‘The effects of the measures were soon felt. The income was more than doubled and public interest attracted to a very great degree. The debts were discharged and near 3,000l. invested.
‘The additions that have been made to the Institution by the library of reference, the mineralogical collection (which, by the assistance and exertions of the Professor of Chemistry, has been made at an expense which bears no comparison to its use and value), the laboratory, the seat of his interesting and extraordinary discoveries, the increased variety of the lectures far exceeding anything in contemplation on the forming of the Institution, have frustrated every attempt to keep the scale of expenditure within the average amount of income.
‘The annual expenditure, including 1,055l. for professors and lectures, is 3,295l. To meet this there is 133l. dividends, and life and annual subscriptions of not more than 2,000l. It is for the interest of the proprietors that some early and decisive measures should be taken for the preservation of their hereditary property, either by new modelling the constitution, so as to make their life and annual subscriptions more productive, or by reducing the expenditure, or by the proprietors and life members paying some annual sum. The proprietors now enjoy much greater advantages than they originally had from the libraries, collections, lectures, and laboratory, and from that in which all Englishmen, and particularly the proprietors of the Royal Institution, must glory, that in our laboratory those discoveries have been made, and are now making, which excite the surprise and admiration of the scientific in every part of the civilised world.
‘For the present support of the Institution, and for the discharge of their bills up to January 1808, some of the managers and visitors have advanced on loan without interest 2,300l. The sale of the stock and the fine for the sublease will pay the debts of the corporation. The proprietors must decide what it will be prudent and practical to adopt for the support of the Institution.