12 BULLETIN OF THE ESSEX INSTITUTE. 



The ladies have formed, and have sustained with spirit 

 for several years, a Local History Class of from fifty to 

 sixty members, meeting every week, and investigating 

 topics of interest through special committees, whose re- 

 ports are read and placed on file and form a valuable 

 record. 



For forty odd years the Institute has sustained a series 

 of field-meetings, modelled in some sort on those of the 

 Scottish Naturalists' Club of Berwick-upon-Tweed. At 

 these, we have held gatherings ranging in attendance 

 from one to four hundred persons, visiting seventy-three 

 localities in every one of the thirty-five towns and cities, 

 and in almost every parish, in the county, besides a dozen 

 spots beyond the county lines. 



The mass of material piled up in Daland House and 

 Plummer Hall must speak for itself. Neither as to quality 

 nor as to quantity is it possible, in the moments allotted 

 me, to do it justice. I shall not attempt it. If our 

 friends will pay us the honor of a visit they will discover 

 not indeed all our wealth, because we have been obliged 

 to resort largely to warehousing, by the outside storage 

 of choice volumes not in constant use ; but they will find 

 Daland House packed from attic to basement, and Plum- 

 mer Hall, of which we occupy the basement, the first 

 floor and the attic, equally overfull. We suppose our- 

 selves to be in possession of between seventy-three and 

 seventy-four thousand bound volumes of books — our 

 collection of pamphlets and unbound volumes has reached 

 the very extraordinary figure of two hundred and sixty-one 

 thousand. The list of libraries in the country having 

 such a catalogue of books is not a long one. In the forty- 

 five States of the Union there may be thirty-eight libraries 

 containing upwards of seventy thousand bound volumes, 

 and there are but very few indeed containing one-half our 



