198 HISTORY OF OUR SOCIETY. 
been well and continuously sustained, while the intro- 
duction of sectional work has been a very important 
departure, and one which I believe has done much to 
strengthen the position of the Society, as it has clearly 
shewn the Executive the direction in which the majority 
of our active members are interested, and thus enabled 
your Committee to arrange for increasingly attractive 
programmes each session. The youngest of all the sections— 
the Photographic—has proved how valuable an adjunct this 
science is to all other sciences as well as how absorbing a 
scientific study it is in itself, and a most delightful con- 
versazione given in St. Paul’s Institute three years ago 
under the auspices of this section, emphatically proved this. 
The Calendar of Nature and Phenological chart have, 
after a continuous and useful life, been abandoned. The 
Meteorological Observations have been continuously kept. 
since Mr. Tripp’s departure, by Messrs. A. Reeve, J. G. 
Wells, and T. Gibbs, and form a most useful portion of 
the Society’s publications. 
I have so far said little as to the part the excursions 
have played in the past, but this is not because I fail to 
appreciate their importance. I am sorry to say, however, 
that the interest shewn by members has not been propor- 
tionate to the amount of trouble taken by those organising 
these excursions, and members have, not infrequently, shewn 
anything but consideration for the leaders—sending in their 
names after the time requested, or, having sent in their 
names, failing to join the excursion. So much has this 
matter disarranged your Committee’s plans, that fully half 
the excursions arranged have had to be abandoned.  Sec- 
tional excursions have frequently been carried out with great 
advantage to those taking part in them, and in this direction 
I think we may continue to advance. I cannot leave this 
part of our Society’s history without calling attention to the 
valuable work done by Mr. T. C. Martin, who, from the 
