EVENING MEETINGS. XXIX 



in intellectual pursuits, but also iu those arts wliich enable men to subdue 

 the wilderness, and to make the earth bring forth her increase. Let me, 

 in passing, pay a warm tribute to the valuable work carried on by the 

 University of New Zealand, whose career and position, both in respect 

 of curriculum and number of students, compare favourably with the 

 older institutions of Sydney and Melbourne. The ladies present will 

 not forget that recognition is due from their sex to the liberal-minded 

 action of this University in having been the first to open its doors to 

 women-students by conferring on them equalit}' with men in the matter 

 of degrees. On the other hand, you have not allowed that great social 

 question which is convulsing Europe, the disposal of the indigent poor, 

 to become a source of discontent and disturbance. You have avoided 

 the pauper workhouses where the State grudgingly gives a maintenance 

 to the aged lifelong worker, under conditions the least agreeable in life 

 lest any should be found to wish to go and do likewise. What wonder, 

 then, that such an institution as the British Association should have its 

 counterpart in Australasia — an association eminently fitted to flourish in 

 such communities as these, removing science from the pursuit only of the 

 few, and marking the democracy of knowledge, by sympathy begetting 

 knowledge and adding again to sympathy ! You have chosen as your 

 place of meeting this year the colony over which I have the honour to 

 preside in the name of Her Majesty ; and, in my dual capacity as the 

 Queen's representative — for does not your very name denote a bond of 

 Imperial unity in its purpose ? — and as the mouthpiece of this important 

 community, I bid you a hearty welcome to our shores. If a layman may 

 express an opinion on such a point, I would say that I think the selection 

 has been eminently a wise one, and that there are reasons why this 

 meeting should be the most interesting yet held by the Association, for 

 in New Zealand you may find objects of scientific interest which will, I 

 believe, amply repay you for your voyage of twelve hundred miles, as I 

 have found them repay my less cultured mind for its voyage of twelve 

 thousand. Certain I am that no word of regret ever fell from any 

 member of the British Association that that Association should have 

 transferred its sphere of operations in 1884 from Groat Britain to one 

 of the younger members of the British Empire ; and, if in Canada, why, 

 at some future time, with our present improved steam communication, 

 should not the British Association meet in Australia, or even in New 

 Zealand? On that occasion Lord Lansdowne, the Governor-General of 

 Canada, commented on the difficulty with which science would have to 

 contend in competing with material activity in a young country. No 

 doubt the leisured class is less numerous, till recently had no existence 

 in the colonies, and is of slow growth, being constantly depleted by those 

 who, having earned their leisure, choose to spend it elsewhere. There 

 is much truth in his remark ; but, on the other hand, the outdoor life of 

 a very large section of the community is conducive to a knowledge of 

 and interest in nature and natural history. The toil here is not so 

 unremitting or so unremunerative as in other older communities, and 

 more spare moments can be devoted to the observation and study of 

 living forms and natural features. It is in this respect, I apprehend, 

 that you welcome among you so large an admixture of the popular or, 

 if I may so distinguish it, " lay " element, and especially may I say of 

 ladies, whose time is likely to be more at their own disposal, and who 

 can take an active and seemly interest in scientific research. I venture 

 to think that the Association should urge npon this " lay " class par- 

 ticularly the value not only of the acquisition and diffusion of know- 

 ledge, but also of scientific method. Scientific method is of special value 

 in these days, because information is so easily acquired from textbooks, 

 popular lectures, and magazine articles that people are tempted to 

 plume themselves on the possession of scientific knowledge, whereas they 



