To the Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences. 



Gentlemen : 



Our Annual Meeting gives iis an opportunity to pause a 

 moment in our work, and note what we have done and what is 

 most necessary to be done in the near future. The past year 

 has been an uneventful one. We have suffered no great loss, 

 and have made no startling gains. Our Museum and Library 

 have been kept open to the public, and have been freely used. 

 Our meetings have been fairly well attended, and some inter- 

 esting discussions have taken place. Our rooms have been used 

 by the Teachers' Association of the Public vSchools of Buffalo, 

 for a series of meetings, by the Electrical Society, by the Field 

 Club, and by the Medical Society. The course of formal lec- 

 tures given by our own Society during the winter, while the 

 attendance did not pay the expenses, were interesting and 

 instructive, and we may hope will bear good fruit in the future. 

 We have not been able to continue our publication of the 

 Bulletin, as we hoped to do at the beginning of the year. I 

 would again call your attention to the importance of this matter, 

 if we are to retain our position among kindred institutions. We 

 are still receiving, every month, numbers of publications from 

 other Societies, who, years ago, placed our name on their list 

 of exchanges, and we are beginning to receive letters asking for 

 our late numbers, thinking that as none had been received from 

 us lately, we had either revised our exchange list or that our 

 publications forwarded had gone astray. It is not creditable to 

 our work or our position that we should allow this matter to rest 

 in this condition. 



The report of the Curator gives you in detail memoranda 

 of the gifts and bequests to the Museum. We need even now 

 more and better arranged case room for the proper display of 

 our collections, so that they may be more ea.sily studied. Our 

 Library especially needs your attention. We have a large mass 



