LXXXII ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
IX.— From The Canadian Institute, Toronto, through 
Pror. COLEMAN. 
The council of the Canadian Institute has the honour to lay 
before its members its fifty-third annual report. 
The council has much pleasure in recording an increased interest 
in the work and an extension in the influence and prestige of the 
Institute. 
During the past session 22 regular meetings have been held, at 
which 25 papers have been read and presented, classified as follows :— 
Geology, 2; Forestry, 3; Topography, 1; Exploration 2; Physics 1; 
Ornithology, 1; Colour Photography, 1; Mining, 1; Mineralogy, 1; 
Astronomy, 2; Ethnology, 1; Morphology, 1; Biology, 1; Arbitration, 
1; Literature, 1; Economics, 1; Botany, 1; History, 1; Miscellaneous, 
2. 
The general interest which many of the papers have excited has 
induced a large number of ladies and gentlemen who are non-members 
to be present at the meetings, and the council in noting this increase 
in the desire for scientific knowledge, ascribe no little portion of it 
to its labours in the past. The introduction of electricity and the 
general use of photography have permitted their use to an extent 
formerly unknown, and in doing so have added much to the interest 
of the subjects of the papers, especially is this the case with those 
papers which are devoted to the progress of exploration in the more 
remote portions of our province and the Dominion. 
The report of the librarian shows that there is a steady improve- 
ment in the library. The special endowment has furnished the funds 
for supplying the lacunæ reported by Miss Cowan, and for purchasing 
some special sets which the Institute did not possess. 
The growth of the lbrary and the increased interest taken in 
the meetings, forces on the council the necessity of urging upon their 
successors the desirability of sparing no effort to dispose of the pre- 
sent building and to remove the Institute to a more central position. 
The centre of population has moved to the west and north, and the 
council notes an increased reluctance on the part of its members to 
come down town. ‘They are confident that if the meetings of the 
Institute could be held in the neighbourhood of College Street, its 
growth and influence would be greatly increased. 
The report of the Biological section appended shows a large 
amount of interesting work done; 14 papers have been read and several 
summer excursions held. 
The council have to express their regret at the loss of the Hon. 
George A. Allan, by whose death the Institute loses one of its oldest 
