

INAUGURAL ADDRESS 



liV 



PROFESSOR RALPH TATE 



President, 

 Adelaide, Tuesday, September 26 fh, 7893. 



My first duty this evening is to acknowledge the high honor the 

 association has conferred on me by electing me as its President. I 

 accept the office with thankfulness, as it rewards me for the long 

 years of patient striving to bethought worthy of such a distinction. 



In the distant future the only antiquity that this country can ever 

 possess is the history of the occupation by its present inhabitants. 

 Its aboriginal people have not furnished any evidence of a past 

 history ; had it, indeed, happened that they had become extinct a 

 quarter of a century before their discovery, the only traces of prior 

 occupation would have been in the form of stone knives and 

 hatchets and flint spearheads. 



Interwoven with the history of the progress of discovery and 

 occupation is that of the successive additions to our knowledge of 

 its physical structure and its natural history. The records of 

 botanical science and of geographical exploration have been 

 brought up to a recent date, but the annals of the history of 

 geological progress have not yet been consecutively placed on 

 record. In the selection of a subject for my address I had 

 experienced great difficulty in discriminating between personal 

 interest and representative duty, and in choosing a 



CENTURY OF GEOLOGICAL PROGRESS 



for my theme I have sacrificed the former, as to please should be a 

 part of my aim ; at least it will be a reward. The labor involved 

 in its preparation has been very heavy, though lightened by the 

 use of Etheridge and Jack's " Bibliograjjliy of Australian Geology," 



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