416 Proceedings. 



that when the work is complete the bulletins may be bound together, and thus 

 he practically equivalent to a moss flora for the Dominion. Mr. Dixon is doing 

 the work of revising Brown's collection without payn.ent, and the country is very 

 fortunate in thus securing a valuable monograph by an eminent specialist for the 

 mere cost of publication. 



Included in the Appendix to Vol. 44 (1912) of the Transactions is a list 

 of earthquakes recorded in New Zealand for the years 1906-11. This list- was 

 accepted under a misapprehension, and without knowledge that there was on record 

 a resolution of the Board disapproving of their inclusion in the Transactions. An 

 arrangement was therefore made with Mr. Hogben whereby the Education Depart- 

 ment bore the cost of printing the list. The Committee is of opinion that the 

 Board might well reconsider its decision as to publishing these lists. They are 

 certainly the results of original investigation, which should find a place in a publi- 

 cation which aims at giving a record of the scientific work done in the Dominion, 

 providing that they are not published elsewhere. 



It has been custon^ary up to the present to publish photographs in the Trans- 

 actions without any indication on the print as to its author. Your Committee thinks 

 that it would be of advantage to give the author's name, if he does not expressly 

 object. It increases the value of certain photographs if the author has either taken 

 or supervised the taking of the picture, or if it has been taken by a person of 

 experience in the subject under consideration, and it also allows of a simple means 

 of acknowledgment if the author is indebted to another for the print. 



There appears in the minds of some an uncertainty as to what year should be 

 cited in reference to back numbers of the Transactions of the Institute ; the diffi- 

 culty arises from the fact that the year printed on the title-page of the volume is 

 that of the year in which the papers are read, and not the date of publication. It 

 should be clearly understood that the latter date is, according to convention, the 

 only correct one, and it would save the Editor and the Printing Office much trouble 

 if this convention were generally observed by all authors. It has been suggested 

 that this mistake might be prevented by omitting the date from the title-page. 



It has been further suggested that the authors who desire their papers to be 

 illustrated by a larger number of blocks than the state of the finances allows should 

 be permitted to supply further illustrations on the payment of the additional cost, 

 subject to the approval of the Editor for the time being. As this procedure intro- 

 duces a principle foreign to the usual practice of the Institute, the Committee would 

 be glad to receive from the Board an expression of opinion on the point. 



Your Committee would also like to emphasize the necessity for authors 

 eliminating- from their manuscript all useless verbiage and irrelevant matter, and 

 further to emphasize the uselessness of submitting for publication material which 

 neither brings forward fresh scientific facts nor suggests new ways of looking at 

 old ones. In this connection it might be as well to adopt rules for the guidance 

 of referees to whom papers are submitted for report, and your Committee would 

 suggest that the following instructions, as used by the Linnaean Society be formally 

 approver! and adopted by this Institute : (1.) Is it desirable that the paper as it 

 stands should be published by the Society as containing facts, or new views of the 

 bearinri of admitted facts, not already published? (2.) Is it desirable that any 

 part of the paper should be omitted, altered, or abridged, as merely general obser- 

 vations, as unnecessarily controversial, as containing expressions liable to give just 

 cause of offence by reason of their personality, or for any other reason? If so, you 

 will please mark in pencil the parts which in your opinion may be so omitted, 

 altered, or abridged. (3.) If illustrations accompany the paper, can any of them 

 be dispensed with? (4.) Would an abstract only give all that is important in the 

 paper, and would such abstract require any woodcut or other illustration, regard 

 being had to previous publications ? 



R. SPEifiHT, for the Committee. 



Ihe folioAviiiL;- resolutions, arisinj^' out of the feport, were carried : — 



Moss Flora. — Mr. Speight moved, and .\[r. Hamilton seconded, That 

 Mr. Dixon's material on the New Zealand Mosses be published in 

 bulletin form. — Carried. 



Major Broun's Papers on Coleoptera. — Mi-. Speight moved, and 

 Mr. Petrie seconded, That the second half of Major Broun's paper be 

 published in this year's Transactions, and that future papers be pub- 

 lished in bulletin form as funds allow. — Cairied. 



