8 
The programme sketched out for the year included 
four Summer Excursions; but of these the principal 
one, that to Cambridge, had to be abandoned on 
account of the few names sent in. This failure, 
following on the previous year’s experience in respect 
of the projected Excursion to Wensleydale and Rich- 
mond, is a matter for regret. The visit to Stonyhurst 
Observatory and College was an unqualified success, 
and the Excursions to Alum Scar and the Heckenhurst 
and Cant Clough Reservoir Works were also profitable 
and enjoyable. The parties on these three occasions 
numbered respectively 49, 11, and 13. 
No Sectional Excursions have been held, the 
evidence afforded by the unfavourable results of 
efforts in this direction in the preceding year, leading 
your Committee to resolve upon their discontinuance. 
Reference should be made to several items in the 
varied programme of the year’s proceedings. Depart- 
ing from the practice adopted for several years of 
holding an Amateur Dramatic Soirée in the spring of 
the year, your Committee arranged for a Recital by 
S. Brandram, Esq., M.A., of one of Shakespeare’s 
Plays. The ‘Merchant of Venice” was the piece 
chosen, and the brilliant rendering of that dramatic 
poem displayed in a remarkable manner the genius 
and power of the eminent reciter. The occasion was 
an intellectual treat of the highest order. 
An extended notice of the paper read by the 
President, Mr. Henry Houlding, on the opening of 
the Autumnal Session, and entitled ‘‘ Local Glimpses : 
Nature and the Ideal,” is contained in this volume. 
The Soirée designed to illustrate ‘‘ Burnley, Old 
and New,” deserves allusion here. The subject 
exemplified was naturally one which had particular 
attraction for the members, and it was not therefore 
surprising, that the gathering was unusually large 
The collection of objects was valuable and unique 
