I 



17 



JULY, 1877. 



The monthly evening meeting of the Society was held on Tuesday, 10th 

 July. His Excellency the Governor was in the chair. 



Charles Henry Smith, Esq., Consular Agent for Italy at Launceston, 

 who had previously been nominated by the Council, was balloted for and 

 declared duly elected as a Fellow of the Society. 



The Hon. Secretary, Dr. Agnew, laid on the table the following returns for 

 the past month, viz., 



1. Number of Visitors to Museum, 1,486. 



2. Ditto to gardens, 3,158. 



3. Plants received at gardens. — From Mr. Wm. Lamdner, Melbourne, 



seeds of Valonia Oak {Quercus ^giloi^s). From Baron F. von 

 Mueller, Melbourne, three packets seeds. 



4. Plants and seeds sent from Gardens : — To the Department of Agri- 



culture, Washington, United States, 100 packets of seeds. For 

 grounds of Cemetery, Cornelian Bay, 40 plants. For grounds of 

 Launceston Hospital, 150 plants. For Horton College, Ross, 100 

 plants. For grounds of St. David's Cathedral, two plants. For 

 grounds of Sandy Bay Cemetery, 50 plants. 



5. Times of leafing, flowering, and fruiting of a few standard plants in 



the Botanic Gardens during June. 



6. Books and Periodicals received. 



7. Presentations to Museum. 

 Meteorological Tables. — 



1. HobartTown, from Mr, F. Abbott.— Table for June. 

 . 2. New Norfolk, from Mr. W. E. Shoobridge.— Ditto. 



3. Mount Nelson, table for June ; Swan Island, ditto for May ; Goose 



Island, ditto for April and May ; South Bruni, ditto for May and 

 June ; Kent's Group, for April. — From the Marine Board. 



4. A series of the American simultaneous meteorological observations, for- 



warded from the chief signal office, Washington, U.S. [In these the 

 " simultaneous" observations taken at Hobart Town by Mr. F. 

 Abbott appear, in the "British Series," for the first time ; the Mel- 

 bourne Observatory furnishing the only other record for these 

 colonies.] 

 The presentations to the Museum were as follows : — 



1. From Master Dunstan. — A specimen of the " More-pork" {Podargus 



Cuvieri), from Kangaroo Point, 



2. From Mr. Hissey. — Two specimens of young of Native Devil {Sarco- 



philus ursinus) from the pouch. 



3. From Mr. J, Brown. — Specimens of iron ore, etc., from Glaziers' Bay. 



4. From Lieut. F. G. C. Langdon, R,N, — 22 polished specimens of Fossil 



Wood from Jamaica. [These beautiful specimens were examined with 

 great interest, the minute structure of the former woody tissues 

 being brought out with peculiar distinctness.] 

 His Excellency, after referring to a former communication he had made 

 to the Society as to the value of a new article of fodder — the pods of the 

 Prosopis puhescens, or Screw Bean — laid on the table some further infor- 

 mation on the subject by an emjDloye at the Cinchona Plantation, Jamaica. 

 From this it appeared that, on one occasion, when a horse had eaten a 

 pound of the pods he was found dead on the morning of the thhd day after- 

 wards, the impression being that the death was due to some poisonous pro- 

 perty in the bean. It was, therefore, evident that as a fodder the bean 

 should be very cautiously tried. And caution was the more necessary as 

 it was well known in Jamaica that the pods of another species of the same 

 genus — Prosopis juliflora — though " a valuable fodder," was apt, especially 

 after rain, to produce intestinal disturbances, and in some cases death. As 

 far as the seed which had been distributed by him was concerned, no harm 



C 



