54 Presidential Address. [voi.'xxxvii. 



PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 



[The following address was intended to have been dehvered 

 by the retiring president (Mr. A. D. Hardy, F.L.S.) at the 

 fortieth annual meeting of the Club on I2th July last, but, owing 

 to the lateness of the hour, had to be held over. — Ed. Vict. 

 Nat.] 



At a time when, evolving from the war, rapid improvements 

 are taking place in locomotion generally by air, land, and water, 

 and especialh' in aviation, the naturahst foresees a hlling up 

 of the blank places of zoogeographic and phytogeographic 

 charts. The world, so far as the wide spaces are concerned, 

 seems to shrink, and the reconnaissance survey of remote parts 

 to give way to detailed examination of smaller areas. African, 

 Australian, and other aerodromes become centres from which 

 investigation of natural history phenomena go hand in hand 

 with commercial adventure, as the flying man peers into 

 recesses of the land and into depths of the sea hitherto un- 

 discovered by the seeing eye, and one of the early results to 

 be expected is the hght that will be thrown on the mysteries of 

 migration of birds and whales and other elusive fauna as the 

 time-beaten tracks of these are intersected or followed by 

 the new routes of human travel. 



We have no fear of the lessening of tlie marine fu'ld, for, 

 though the examination intensifies, the immensity is constant. 

 Only parts of the fringing seas, where bay and estuary silts are 

 polluted by river-borne or dredged sewage, becomi> a source 

 of anxiety — the matter being one of concern alike for the fishing 

 industry, the naturalist, and the health officer ; and to this 

 extent only is the marine biologist troubled as to diminution 

 of his hunting-ground. 



Turning from the world at large to our own State of Victoria, 

 we have the same shrinkage of the terrestrial field of nature 

 study as the " squatters' nms " (and with them the larger 

 fauna) disappear. How many members of this Club have 

 seen a flock of kangaroo, red or grey, in their wild state ? I 

 venture to say that, excepting the veti-ran members, very few 

 can answer in the affirmative. 



The impetus given to closer settKnient in the process of 

 repatriation of discharged soldiers means the brraking-up of 

 large estates and the curtailment or abolition of harbours of 

 refuge which, years ago, were ungrudgingly afforded by 

 many of the large land-holders. Further, following the operations 

 of the Country Roads Board and the Parliamentary Railways 

 Standing Committee, better access is being given to the back 

 country ; and along these lines of communication, whether 

 original or improved, settlement will proceed, and the existence 



