• AUGUST 8, 1910. 



The Monthly General Meeting of the Society was held at 

 the Museum on the evening of August 8, 1910. 



:\[r. T. Stephens. ALA.. F.G.S.. in the chair. 



THE PETTERD COLLECTION OF MINERALS. 



Dr. Noetling said that the collection of minerals which had 

 been left to the Royal Society by the late Mr. W. F. Petterd, 

 of Launceston, was a very valuable one. and would form one 

 of the most important additions to the Museum that could be 

 imagined. It would be of the greatest educational value, and 

 if the Council of the Royal Society had not accepted the be- 

 quest, they would not have then been doing their duty either 

 to the I\Iembers of the Society or to the public. The bequest 

 should be accepted by the Society, even if they had to make 

 some sacrifices to do so. The collection had iDeen valued by 

 the best experts at £1,212, and the probate duty upon it 

 amounted to £121 4s. He would move: — "That this General 

 jMeeting of the Royal Society approves of the expenditure for 

 the payment of probate duty, amounting to £121 4s.. upon 

 the mineral collection beqeuathed to the Society by the late 

 Mr. W. F. Petterd, of Launceston." 



}dr. R. ~SL Johnston seconded the motion. The Council 

 really had no choice but to act as they did, or take the risk of 

 losing this valuable collection. Mr. Petterd was a native of 

 Hobart, and no doubt was grateful to the Society for the aid 

 that it had given him in his natural history and mineralogical 

 studies in his early days, and therefore wished to secure his col- 

 lection of minerals to Hobart as an acknowledgment. It was 

 the best memorial he could have, that of good work well done. 



Mr. L. Giblin said that on behalf of the Members of the 

 Society he would like to ask for a little information as to how 

 the finances of the Society stood; how it was proposed to meet 

 the debt that had been incurred; and if it could be met without 

 endangering the Society's journal. He also wished to know 

 what further expense would be involved in the housing of the 

 collection, and if there was room for it to be properly displayed? 

 There was a valuable botanical collection — Gunn's collection — 

 which had been languishing for many years in the cellars of the 

 Museum for want of ability to display it, and he was wondering 

 whether the Petterd collection was liable to be overtaken by the 

 same fate. 



The Chairman said that he believed that the payment of the 

 probate duty on the collection would leave a slight debit 

 balance. The Council were positively assured by those who were 

 acting for the late Mr. Petterd's family that if this bequest was 

 not accepted by the Royal Society it would go into the general 

 estate, and could not be dealt with or administered until the 

 youngest child came of age. v/hich would be a good many years 

 hence. 



Dr. Noetling said that the Council had had to confer with 

 the trustees of the Museum before the collection could be placed 

 there, and the trustees had agreed that they would accept and 



