11»15] The Visit of the British Association to Australia 3:35 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 



Friday, February 19, 1015. 



Edward Pollock, Esq., F.R.C.S., Yice-President, 

 in the Chair. 



Professor Henry E. Armstrong, Ph.D. LL.D. D.Sc. 

 F.R.S. M.R.L 



The Visit of the British Association to Australia. 



The British Association for the Advancement of Science is an estab- 

 lished Imperial Institution, now in its eighty-fifth year. Severely 

 affected by wandering instincts in its matnrity, it has journeyed 

 thrice to Canada — to Montreal in 1884, to Toronto in 1897, to 

 Winnipeg in 1904 — ever growing bolder in its westward flights. 

 Meanwhile, it began to travel equatorwards and in 1905 visited 

 South Africa, stopping at Cape Town, Durban, Pietermaritzburg, 

 Colenso and Ladysmitb, Johannesburg, Bloemfontein, Kimberley, 

 Bulawayo, finally sighting the Victoria Falls, where the President 

 personally opened the bridge over the Zambesi ; some of the party 

 returned via the East Coast, so that they circumnavigated the African 

 Continent. This last year the Association reached the Antipodes. 

 Some of us journeyed across the Australian Continent, from Free- 

 mantle on the extreme south-west, by sea to Adelaide, thence by rail 

 to Melbourne and afterwards to Sydney, so noted for its harbour, 

 finally to Brisbane high up on the east coast : from there we 

 steamed up the eastern margin by sea, skirting the Great Barrier 

 Reef, with its wonderful Coral Island scenery, to Thursday Island 

 in Torres Straits, calling first at Townsville and its appendage 

 Magnetic Island, then at Cairns, on the Queensland coast, passing 

 thence westwards to Port Darwin, the capital of the Northern terri- 

 tory, slightly west of the position which Adelaide occupies in the 

 south : so we all but circumnavigated our great island possession. 

 Small parties visited either Tasmania or New Zealand. 



In Australia various excursions were made to points of interest 

 inland away from the big towns— to forests and other regions of 

 indescribable beauty near Melbourne ; to the Mount Lofty district 

 and the National Park near x4delaide ; to the wonderful scenery, near 

 Sydney, of the Blue Mountains, including the limestone caves for 

 which the district is famous ; to mining centres, such as Kalgoorlie, 

 Iron Knob. Broken Hill. Ballarat, Bendigo and Mount Morgan ; to 



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