568 
Extracts from the Council Minute-Book of the Linnean Society. 
The Council proceeded to take the above letter into consideration, 
and voted the following Address to be presented to the Court of Di- 
rectors on Tuesday next, the 26th instant, by a Deputation of the 
Council, viz. 
“The Council of the Linnean Society having had a letter laid before 
them by the President, addressed to His Lordship by the Chair- 
man and Deputy Chairman of the Court of Directors of the East 
India Company, in which that Honourable Court have been pleased 
to offer for the acceptance of the Society the extensive collection of 
dried plants preserved in the Museum of the India House, take the 
earliest opportunity of expressing their high sense of the distin- 
guished honour conferred upon the Society by this unexampled act 
of liberality. 
“The Council, in behalf of the Society, accept with feelings of 
profound gratitude the Collection thus proffered to them, and beg 
to assure the Court that it shall be held as a trust for the general 
benefit of science. 
“ The Council cannot avoid expressing their admiration of the 
enlightened policy shown by the Honourable Court of Directors 
with relation to their collections in natural history, in extending 
the advantage to be derived from them by the most liberal distri- 
bution of specimens throughout the scientific world, and by this 
memorable instance of their munificence in placing the fruits of 
the labours of Kónig, Roxburgh, Róttler, Russell, Klein, Hamilton, 
Heyne, Wight, Finlayson, and Wallich with those of the immortal 
Linnzeus. 
* The East India Company, by extending its patronage to those 
distinguished naturalists who have cultivated science in Asia, so 
much to their own honour, and to the credit of the service to which 
they belonged, and by the generous use of the rich materials in its 
possession, has deeply impressed the members of every learned insti- 
tution throughout Europe and America with feelings of admiration- 
and respect ; and the Council of the Linnean Society can only reecho 
the voice of general acknowledgement for the great services which 
the Honourable Company has thus rendered to the cause of science. 
