29 



Address to the Cotswold Naturalists* Club, Read at tlie Winter 

 Meeting, January 22, 1850. By Sir Thomas Tancred, Bart. 



Gentlemen, 



I feel that I owe an apology to the Club for assuming one of 

 the duties of our excellent President, Mr. Baker, by delivering 

 the Annual Address at this meeting ; my excuse, however, must 

 be, that I act by command of my superior officer, who pleads 

 that as he has been doing duty as Secretary for most part of the 

 past season, the Secretary should take his place on the present 

 occasion. I will therefore avail myself of the wholly irregular 

 position in which I am placed, to pay a tribute to the merits of 

 the happy freedom from the restraints of rigid laws, and the 

 absence of restrictions in which, as a body, we glory. I believe 

 it is an important principle in the success of our prototype, the 

 Berwickshire Club, that the occasional meetings of those of con- 

 genial tastes, for the purpose of enjoying agreeable converse 

 amidst scenes of interest and beauty, are not hampered by pe- 

 dantic rules, the infliction of fines, or any compulsory regula- 

 tions beyond those which good feeling and a desire to promote 

 harmony and mutual enjoyment will dictate. Having no pro- 

 perty, like a light-armed corps of irregulars, we can meet and 

 disperse without the impedimenta by which the movements of 

 more regular bodies are obstructed. 



As our Annual Address is chiefly a recapitulation of the 

 meetings of the past season, I am gratified (after a perusal of 

 the notes with which our President has in my absence enlivened 

 our minute-book) to be able to congratulate the now numerous 

 members of our Club on our present healthy and prosperous 

 condition, after the close of our fourth summer. Our meetings 

 have by no means fallen off in the interest of the scenes to which 

 they have conducted us. We measure our success more by the 

 agreeable meetings and intercourse between persons of congenial 



