1898.] Trav;G'E'R'— Field Clad Conference, 203 



At 5.0 p.m. a start was made for home, and the whole party sat down 

 to dinner at 8.0. 



After dinner a brief conference was held on the occasion of the second 

 o-atheriug together of all the Field Clubs of Ireland. 



Francis Joseph Biggkr, m.r.i.a., rising, said it fell to him as Vice- 

 President of the Belfast Naturalists' Field Club to take the chair on this 

 occasion, in the absence of Rev. C. H. Waddell, the President of the 

 senior Society. This was the second triennial conference that the Irish 

 Field Clubs had held, the first having been at Galway in 1895. It was 

 gratifying to see on this occasion many faces that had become familiar 

 at Galway, and equally pleasant to see here many new faces. He called 

 on the Secretary of the Union to make a statement. 



R. Ivi/OYD Praeger, B.E., M.R.I.A., President of the Dublin Naturalists' 

 Field Club and Secretary of the Irish Field Club Union, said he hoped he 

 might be permitted to refer briefly to the history of the Union under 

 whose auspices they now met, and to state what work the Union had 

 been doing since their last Conference. Having referred to the origin of 

 the Union, which had been duly recorded at their last meeting (see Irish 

 Naturalist, 1895, p. 225) he said that the work of the Union in arranging 

 for interchanges of lecturers between the various Clubs during the winter 

 sessions, and for the loan of diagrams, lantern-slides, &c., had been 

 steadily carried out, and he thought all the Clubs had benefited by these 

 arrangements. Things had gone smoothly and he hoped successfully. 



At the present Conference members would, he did not doubt, be glad 

 to hear that no official business required their consideration, and the 

 meeting was held chiefly in order to give Field Club members an oppor- 

 tunity of bringing forward any suggestion they might have to make 

 regarding the extension of Field Club work in Ireland, or the improve- 

 ment or development of the existing inter-Club arrangements. 



W. A. FoGERTY, M.A., M.D., President of the Limerick Naturalists' Field 

 Club, expressed the pleasure it gave him and the fellow-members who 

 were with him to be present on this excursion. Their Club, which was 

 now six years old, had benefited materially from the formation of the 

 Field Club Union. They had had lectures from a number of the leading 

 members of the Dublin and Belfast Clubs, and had received valuable 

 assistance in many ways. Owing to the recent inclusion of archaeology 

 in the scope of the Club work, the membership had recently largely 

 increased, and now numbered 260 (applause). The only suggestion he 

 had to offer was that, if the season at which these joint meetings were 

 held could be varied occasionally, it might result in the finding of fresh 

 plants and animals. 



Wm. HumbIvE Johnson, Secretary of the Cork Naturalist's Field Club, 

 regretted the absence of Mr. J. L. Copeman, President of that Society, 

 as owing to his recent accession to the Secretaryship, he hardly felt 

 competent to speak on the relations between his Club and the other Field 

 Clubs and the Union. Buthejoined with previous speakers in testifying 

 to the material benefit that the Union had been to his Society. 



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