20 PRESIDENTS VALEDICTORY ADDRESS. 
have seen the production of numberless specimens illustrative of 
our local fauna and flora, but collectively the association has taken 
no steps towards the realisation of its great object. This is a point 
which will doubtless receive the immediate attention of the incoming 
council. 
Amongst the contributions of individual members to our meetings 
I may refer to Mr. James Abbott’s discovery of Potentilla Norvegica 
as a denizen and numerous contributions by our friends Nelson and 
Taylor in the department of conchology. Two of the society’s. 
corresponding members, Messrs. Davis and Rawson have continued 
their valuable observations on the birds of the district and on the 
varying features of the Natural History of the year, and our archives 
are enriched by their MS. contributions, of which at no distant date 
it is hoped good use may be made, In the second department of its 
work the association has been more successful and the only point 
we have seriously to deplore is the smallness of the attendance at 
our meetings. The papers read during the year have manifested 
considerable ability and several of them have dealt with matters of 
local importance. Among these I will mention papers on the Ex- 
hibits in the Exhibition, including a very interesting one on the 
Archzological department by Mr. John Holmes, on the combustion 
of Bituminous Coal and the Manufacture of Steel. Papers of less lo- 
cal interest but containing original work which would not otherwise 
have seen the light, locally at all events, have been delivered by our 
Borough Analyst, Mr. Fairley, in which he introduced to our notice 
his new oxide of uranium and laid before us the results of many 
original and important researches he has made in the higher depart- 
ments of Chemistry, and by Mr. Abbott, on the Life History of Chara 
where we had the results of the same earnest and industrious obser- 
vations that gave us last year the first confirmation of Dr. Farlow’s 
interesting discovery of the non-sexual reproduction of Ferns. Mr. 
A. L. Halkett Dawson read a singularly able paper on Theories 
of Instinct, containing many original ideas and the results of careful 
observation. In thus particularising such papers as appear to be 
distinguished by containing much original matter or by being of local 
interest and therefore specially suitable to this association, I must 
not be understood as passing over the other papers of the year be- 
cause wholly unworthy of notice. The facts in most cases are quite 
otherwise, as many of you can testify, but the limits of a valedictory 
address are stringent. Of the conversational meetings of the year 
we have not avery satisfactory tale to tell. The attendance at them 
has been small, and on several occasions the exhibits have not been 
either numerous or interesting. There are many exceptions to this 
and on more than one occasion these meetings have been character- 
ised by the exhibition of novelties, and the production of the results 
