May 25, 1857.] ( 365 ) 



PRESENTATION 



ROYAL AWARDS 



TO 



MR. AUGUSTUS 0. GREGORY, THE EXPLORER OF NORTH 

 AUSTRALIA ; AND LT.-COLONEL ANDREW SCOTT WAUGH, 

 DIRECTOR OF THE TRIGONOMETRICAL SURVEY OF INDIA. 



The President opened the Meeting by making tlie following state- 

 ment of the grounds on which the Council had awarded the 

 Medals : — 



The Founder's Gold Medal has been awarded to Mr. Augustus C. 

 Gregory, for his extensive and accurate surveys in Australia, and 

 particularly for his last great and successful exploration of North 

 Australia and his journey thence, or from the Victoria of Stokes to the 

 Colony of New South Wales, as recommended by the Eoyal Geogra- 

 phical Society, and carried out under the orders of Her Majesty's 

 Government. 



When Her Majesty's Government decided that an exploration of 

 North Australia should be made upon the general plan advocated 

 by this Society, and in accordance with the suggestions of our 

 members Stokes and Sturt, they wisely selected so experienced an 

 Australian surveyor as Mr. Gregory to carry out this great and im- 

 portant project. That gentleman was already well known to us by 

 his successful labours in unravelling the condition of the interior 

 of Western Australia, as recorded and mapped in the 18th and 

 22nd volumes of our Journal. In the first of these journe3"s 

 (in 1846) he ascertained that the inner part of that colony is 

 generally flat, broken here and there by low hills of granite or other 

 igneous rock, the depressions being usually occupied by salt lakes 

 or marshes, no fresh-water streams having yet been detected. In 

 1848, Mr. Gregory proceeded from Perth on what was termed "the 

 Settlers' Expedition," or an endeavour to discover a tract of good 



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