126 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Dec. 



thanks for the forbearance and kindness you have at all times 

 shewn to me in those shortcomings which have occurred during 

 my tenure of office. And while it is with . feelings of gratitude 

 that I tender to you my resignation, they are mingled, neverthe- 

 less, with feelings of pride for the honor you have conferred 

 upon me. 



It is not, gentlemen, due to any personal exertions or energy on 

 my own part that we have arrived at this, the termination of 

 another year of great prosperity and increased usefulness ; but it 

 is to those friends whose scientific efforts have been so well 

 directed ; and it is to you who have trodden so zealously the path 

 of those few devoted men whom we may be proud to call our pre- 

 decessors and the founders of this Institution. It is, I repeat, to 

 your efforts that our increased prosperity must be attributed. It 

 is a noble object that has invited us to these Halls of Science. 

 We meet together to contemplate the teachings of God in Nature ; 

 and our mutual aim should be, and we hope has been, to decipher 

 some new word in the pages of that great book, in order that we 

 may the better learn the will and the workings of Him who 

 ordereth all things well. We have sought to study the method of 

 God's workings in nature ; for in the vision of science there is 

 nothing too minute for our notice, or unworthy of it. The means 

 for the investigation of almost every branch of Natural Science 

 are gradually extending ; and the Montreal Natural History 

 Society is not the least important of those institutions which are 

 spreading over our country, and the world generally, scientific 

 knowledge, for science is nothing more than knowledge reduced to 

 order. But to say that science is worthy of your pursuit, is at 

 best a waste of words. You know too well its importance ; for by 

 science we have converted the products of our forests and our 

 fields into articles of commerce ; we have by science abridged 

 human labour to an immense extent ; we have by science invented 

 machines, some of immense power, all but surpassing human efforts 

 at calculation, and others which almost rival the winds in swift- 

 ness, propelled on road-ways that have compassed our globe by 

 their iron bauds ; and science, again, has nearly achieved a victory 

 over the velocity of thought, light and sound, in the invention and 

 application of our electrical telegraph. 



Where shall I specially turn to contemplate the wondrous works 

 of God, or to follow up the yearly march of science ? Shall I dip 

 with a Logan, a Dawson, a Hunt, and a Billings, beneath the 



