PROCEEDINGS FOR 1882. IX: 
The injury which Canadian science and the reputation of Canada sustain in this way is well known 
to many who are present and who have been personal sufferers. 
Should this Society have sufficient means placed at its disposal to publish Transactions equal—I 
shall not say to those of the Royal Society of London or the Smithsonian Institution at Washington 
—but to those of such bodies as the Philadelphia Academy or the Boston Society of Natural History, 
an incalculable stimulus would be given to science in Canada, by promoting research, by securing to 
this country the credit of the work done in it, by collecting the information now widely scattered, 
and by enabling scientific men abroad to learn what is being done here. It is not intended that such 
means of publication should be limited to the works of members of the Society. In this respect it 
will constitute a judicial body to decide as to what may deserve publication. Its Transactions should 
be open to good papers from any source, and should in this way enable the younger and less known 
men of science to add to their own reputation and that of the country, and to prepare the way for 
admission to membership of this Society. 
Few expenditures of public money are more profitable to the State than that which promotes 
scientific publication. The actual researches made imply much individual labour and expense, no 
part of which falls on the public funds; and by the comparatively small cost of publication the 
country obtains the benefit of the results obtained, its mental and industrial progress is stimulated, 
and it acquires reputation abroad. This is now so well understood that in most countries public aid 
is given to research as well as to publication. Here we may be content, in the first instance, with 
_the latter alone; but, if the Society shall at first be sustained by the Government, it may be hoped 
| that, as in older countries, private benefactions and bequests will flow into it, so that eventually it 
may be able not merely to afford means of publication but to extend substantial aid to young and 
struggling men of science who are following out, under difficulties, important investigations. 
In return for aid given to this Society, the Government may also have the benefit of its advice 
as a body of experts in any case of need. The most insignificant natural agencies sometimes attain 
to national importance. A locust, a midge, or a parasitic fungus, may suddenly reduce to naught 
the calculations of a finance-minister. The great natural resources of the land and of the sea are 
alike under the control of laws known to science. We are occasionally called on to take our part in 
the observation of astronomical or atmospheric phenomena of world-wide interest. In such cases it 
is the practice of all civilized governments to have recourse to scientific advice, and in a Society like 
this our Government can command a body of men free from the distracting influences of private and 
local interests and able to warn against the schemes of charlatans and pretenders. 
Another object which we should have in view is that of concentrating the benefits of the several 
local societies scattered through the Dominion. Some of these are of long standing and have done 
much original work. The Literary and Historical Society of Quebec is, I believe, the oldest of these 
bodies, and its Transactions include not merely literature and history but much that is of great value 
in natural science, while it has been more successful than any of our other societies in the accumula- 
tion of a library. The Natural History Society of Montreal, of which I have had the honour to be a 
member for twenty-seven years, is now in its fifty-third year. It has published seventeen volumes of 
Proceedings, including probably a larger mass of original information respecting the natural history of 
Canada than is to be found in any other publication. It has accumulated a valuable museum, and has 
done much to popularize science. It has twice induced the American Association for the Advancement 
of Science to hold its meetings in Canada, and was the first body to propose the establishment of a 
Geological Survey. The Canadian Institute of Toronto, occupying the field of literature as well as 
science, though a younger has been a more vigorous society ; and its Transactions are equally voluminous 
and valuable. The Natural History Society of St. John, New Brunswick, though it has not published 
so much, has carried out some very important researches in local geology, which are known and 
valued throughout the world. The Nova Scotian Institute of Natural Science is a flourishing body 
and publishes valuable Transactions. The Institut Canadien of Quebec, and the Ottawa Natural 
Pro. 1882. 8. 
