i895. NATURAL SCIENCE IN NEWCASTLE. 171 



field meetings, " undertakes the formation and publication of correct 

 lists of the various natural productions of the counties of Northumber- 

 land and Durham " ; and also " that a succinct account of the geology 

 of the district be prepared." It was further resolved that " local 

 collections be formed and placed, with the consent of the Natural 

 History Society, in the Newcastle Museum." Sub-committees to 

 carry out these views were appointed, and included many still honoured 

 names ; in various branches of Zoology, John and Albany Hancock, 

 R. E. Bewick, M. J. T. Sidney, J. H. Fryer, Joshua Alder; in Ento- 

 mology, James Hardy, J. T. Bold, John Hancock, and Thomas Pigg, 

 junior; in Botany, Messrs. Thornhill, Thompson, and J. Storey, and 

 the Rev. J. T. Bigge ; in Geology, Messrs. Hutton, Fryer, Sopwith, 

 Loftus, and King. 



From the first the Tvansactions of the Tyneside Naturalists' Field 

 Club took a high place in Natural History literature, and this 

 continued during the lives of the able naturalists who were its 

 parents, and I well recollect Dr. John E. Gray, a most competent 

 judge, speaking to me of those Tvansaciions as the most valuable 

 provincial Natural History publication in the kingdom. Our natura- 

 lists now are fewer in number, and neither the Club nor its publica- 

 tions are in the flourishing condition they once were. Let us hope 

 that a time of revival will come. There have been published six 

 volumes of the original Transactions of the Tyneside Naturalists Field 

 Club, and eleven of the new series, which dates from 1865, from which 

 period the joint papers of " Natural History Society " and of the 

 " Tyneside Naturalists' Field Club " have been issued under the title 

 Natural History Transactions of Northumberland and Durham. 



[As the Newcastle Museum of Natural History was described in 

 the August number of Natural Scien'ce by Mr. Alexander Meek, it 

 is not thought necessary to include here the section of the address 

 devoted to this institution. — Ed., Nat. Sci.] 



The Museum of Antiquities. 



The Museum of the Newcastle Society of Antiquities is nearly 

 coeval with the present century. Its nucleus consists of the anti- 

 quarian portion of the Allan Museum handed over to the Society of 

 Antiquaries by the Literary and Philosophical Society, who had come 

 into its possession, and who retained for a time the zoological portion 

 in their own hands. Round this nucleus were gathered the results of 

 various excavations at Borcovicus, Habitancum, and other Roman 

 stations, also some interesting Saxon stones, and the fragments of the 

 remarkable Rothbury Cross. With the exceptions above mentioned, 

 the treasures of the museum have been gathered piecemeal through 

 the generosity of individual donors, and there has been no considerable 

 purchase from any other collection. 



The museum is, on the whole, richer in remains of the Roman 

 than of any other period. There is, however, a large collection of 



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