PROCEEDINGS 



OF THE 



ROYAL PHYSICAL SOCIETY. 



SESSION CVIII. 



Wednesday, 20th Novemher 1878.— John Falconer King, Esq., 

 President, in the Chair. 



The Chairman delivered the following opening address : 



It has been my good fortune on more than one occasion to 

 have occupied a place at this table, and heard from the lips 

 of retiring Presidents, on the occasion of their reading the 

 opening address for the session, the most pleasant and 

 interesting accounts of the proceedings of the Eoyal Physical 

 Society in by-gone years. These reminiscences, although 

 in all ways interesting, have had for me both a dark 

 and a bright side. There can be no doubt, for example, 

 that the Society at one time was in a much more flourish- 

 ing state than it has been for the last few years; and 

 although it may be very pleasant to hear, and from the 

 lips of the very men who themselves have experienced 

 what they describe, such graphic accounts of the palmy 

 days of the Eoyal Physical Society, still it must be con- 

 ceded that there is always a tinge of sadness inseparably 

 connected with such recitals, as, however unreflecting and 

 unsentimental one may be, we cannot help contrasting, in 

 some slight degree at any rate, these grand days of brilliant 

 sunshine in which the Society at one time basked, with the 

 somewhat overcast and cloudy weather it has in later years 

 VOL. v. A 



