208 THE PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. [Sess. Lxxr. 
The presidential address of the previous session, omitted 
from last year’s publications, is printed now :-— 
By the favour of the Honorary Assistant Secretary, I am 
able to give the following state of the Roll of the Society :— 
Honorary Fellows: Royal 1, British 6, Foreign 22; 
Ordinary Fellows: Resident 109, Non-Resident 46 ; Corre- 
sponding Members 41; Associates 6; Lady Members 6. 
Total 237. 
During the past year the Society has been strengthened 
by the addition of :— 
Ordinary Fellows: Resident 6, Non-Resident 1. Total 7. 
And during the same period it has lost by death :—Foreign 
Fellow 1, Ordinary Resident Fellows 4, Corresponding 
Members 3. Total 8. 
Patrick NEILL FRASER.—In Mr. Neill Fraser the Society 
has been deprived of one of its oldest members, and the ranks 
of British Botany became poorer by the loss of a recognised 
authority upon ferns. Of his early years and first introduction 
to botany we have no record, but may conjecture that his 
natural bent would be stimulated by association with Dr. 
Patrick Neill—so prominent a figure in botanical and horti- 
cultural circles in the first half of last century—whose name- 
child he was, and to whose business he, with his brother, suc- 
ceeded in 1851. I find that in 1852 Mr. Neill Fraser enrolled 
as a second year general student in the Class of Botany at 
the Royal Botanic Garden—of the first enrolment I have 
found no trace. In the same year he joined the Class 
excursion to Ireland, and the published accounts of these 
excursions furnish evidence that then, as at later excursions, 
the group of ferns specially attracted him. During his 
whole life he amassed ferns from all regions, in part collected 
by himseli—for he was a keen field botanist, particularly if 
there was a chance of finding ferns—and his herbarium of 
the group became one of the best in the country. I am glad 
‘to be able to say that it has been acquired for the Royal 
Botanic Garden, and when incorporated will add materially 
to the already good collection there. 
At Rockville, his residence at Murrayfield, where the 
