PROCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY. 545 



out what seems to me to be the wishes of the majority of the Society. 

 Believe me, yours sincerely, 1). J. Scouhfield." 



Mr. Gordon then moved the following resolution : " That the Report 

 of the Committee be adopted, and referred to the Council for considera- 

 tion and the taking of such steps as may be in the best interests of the 

 Society." He thought the question was one which it was very desirable 

 that they should not decide upon off-hand. As stated in the report of 

 the Committee, in reply to the inquiry for the names of ladies who 

 would be prepared to join the Society if the by-laws were altered, no 

 names had been submitted : so far as they knew, therefore, no ladies 

 desired to join. It had, however, transpired that subsequently inquiries 

 had been made by some of those gentlemen interested in promoting the 

 proposal that had been made, one of whom made a communication in 

 which he stated that he had ascertained that if the by-laws were altered 

 there were half-a-dozen lady members of the Linnean Society who would 

 be prepared to join this Society. This intimation was, however, made in 

 a form very difficult to embody in the report. There was a possibility 

 thus indicated that by passing the original resolution, they might secure 

 an access of half-a-dozen ladies, but on the other hand they had received 

 communications which showed that the passing of that resolution would 

 lead to the immediate resignation of several Fellows, so that whilst it 

 was not certain that they would be gainers financially, it was certain 

 that they would thereafter miss from their Meetings some Fellows who 

 were accustomed to take an active part in their proceedings. This was 

 the reason for the remark in the report that there were considerations 

 which made it very desirable that the matter should not be hurriedly 

 decided ; he thought it a fortunate circumstance that there was no 

 urgency about the matter, as nobody was put to any actual inconvenience 

 by the by-laws as they then stood. Still the proposal having received so 

 much support, he thought it should not be altogether put aside but 

 placed in a position in which it could be dealt with whenever it assumed 

 a practical shape. It was manifestly a very difficult question, seeing 

 that they had three reports before them, and he therefore suggested that 

 it would be unwise to take any other course than that suggested by the 

 Report of the Committee. It was not intended thereby to preclude 

 discussion of the question, but it was intended to put it in a way of 

 being disposed of easily, and without any unnecessary friction. 



Mr. Conrad Beck seconded Mr. Gordon's resolution ; there did not 

 appear to be anything which could be considered urgent in the matter, 

 as no ladies seemed to wish to attend the Meetings, and he thought the 

 report of the Committee took a very fair view of it, and ought to be 

 accepted. 



Mr. Skinner asked how many ladies were at the present time Fellows 

 of the Society. 



Mr. Gordon said there were ten, of whom four were in America, 

 three were in the provinces, and the rest within a hour or so of London, 



Mr. Heron- Allen asked leave to move an amendment to the resolu- 

 tion moved by Mr. Gordon on behalf of the Special Committee. He 

 had not been a member of the Special Committee, and could not know 

 therefore what had caused them to come to the conclusions embodied in 

 their report. The question appeared to him to be one of vital iui- 



Awj. 18th, 1909 2 o 



