PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS—SECTION B. 61 
agricultural, and sanitary departments—not to mention others ; 
and these departments have at their command men who could in 
many cases, at very slight expense, collect from time to time 
valuable material. Could it not be so managed that an indivi- 
dual, or individuals, thoroughly capable of dealing with some 
special investigation, and desirous of following it up, should 
apply to this Association, or to a specially-appointed committee, 
for assistance ; and might not such assistance take the form of 
accrediting such individual or individuals to the government of 
that colony from which he wishes to obtain material in such a 
way that the authorities would be induced to take steps for 
obtaining a supply of such material? In most cases the cost 
involved would be very small. The plan seems to me to be 
feasible, and it might, to some extent, prevent duplication of 
work, for it would become generally known that certain persons 
were carrying out such and such investigations. Of course, 
such applications would need to be governed by regulations ; 
but should the suggestion meet with your approval, it will be 
easy to discuss the details at a later period. 
If we enquire now what has been done in the region of 
mineral chemistry (I am speaking, remember, chiefly from a 
purely scientific point of view), we shall find, I think, that in 
this department even less has been accomplished. It is true we 
have a large number of analyses in official reports of one kind 
and another, but these have, for the most part, been undertaken 
and published purely from a commercial point of view, and there 
has been very little careful and systematic analysis of the less 
common and less useful minerals, of which many varieties are to 
be found. So far as I have been able to ascertain there is 
scarcely any record of the discovery of the rarer elements. The 
only instance I have came across is the analysis of a sample of 
monasite, which was examined by Mr. Dixon, of the Technical 
College, N.S.W., and which he found to contain Cerium, 
Lanthanum, Thorium, and Didymium. In one or two instances. 
some of the less rare elements have been discovered ; for example, 
Mr. Mingaye, at the first meeting of this Association, proved the 
presence of considerable quantities of tellurium in some bismuth 
ores from Captain’s Flat, N.S.W., and some years ago I 
showed that the appearance of brilliant yellow, reddish, and green 
colourations on white bricks made in the neighbourhood of Sydney 
were due to the presence of vanadium. I have found small 
quantities of vanadium widely distributed in many clays in the 
neighbourhood of Sydney. But is it not, to say the least of it, 
highly probable that in the large areas of mineral country which 
exist In so many parts of Australasia there are waiting to be 
found many minerals, possibly many new ones, containing either 
considerable quantities of rare but already known substances, or 
perhaps even new elements. That they have not been found I 
