PRESIDENT'S ADDEESS 



BY 



H. C. KUSSELL. B.A, F.R.S., F.R.A.S, F.R.M.S, 



A Vice-President of the Royal Society, N.S.W., 

 Government Astronomer, N.S.W., 



At the First Meetmg of the Australasian Association for 

 the Advancement of Science. 



It "w€fe not without serious misgiving as to my fitness for 

 the office that I accepted, in the early days of this Association, 

 the honorable position to which you elected me ; and could I have 

 foreseen that your choice would call me to preside at such a great 

 and representative gathering as this, held in the great hall of our 

 University, within which all the associations are so enobling, I 

 must have declined the honor which your kindness has conferred 

 upon me. I can only assure you that I am deeply sensible of the 

 importance of the duties you have asked me to fulfil, and that it 

 is my earnest desire to do everything I can to further the object 

 for which we are met together. I must ask you to look kindly 

 on the many short-comings which I know will mark my efforts. 

 In July, 18.31, just 57 years ago, Mr. (afterwards Sir) David 

 Brewster, wrote to the Secretary of the Yorkshire Philosophical 

 Society, and proposed that the Society should call a meeting of 

 all the scientific men in the United Kingdom, with a view to the 

 formation of an Association for the AdAancement of Science. The 

 proposal was approved and encouraged by the Society, and received 

 the most zealous and effective support from Sir John Herschel 

 and Sir Roderick Murchison in London, and from Mr. Robison, 

 Mr. Forbes, and Mr. Johnstone of Edinburgh. A committee was 

 appointed to consider how it should be done, and they reported : 

 " That they were of opinion that the invitations for the first 

 meeting, which was to be held in York, should be co-extensive with 

 whatever desire there might be throughout the country to promote 

 science." Invitations were accordingly sent out in the form 



B 



