DECEASE OF HON. MARSHALL P. WILDER ANNOUNCED. 239 



The annual report of the Fruit Committee was read by E. W. 

 Wood, Chairman, accepted, and referred to the Committee on 

 Publication. 



The annual report of the Library Committee was read by Wil- 

 liam E. Endicott, Chairman, accepted, and referred to the Com- 

 mittee on Publication. Agreeably to a recommendation in this re- 

 port, it was voted that the Society's Silver Medal be conferred 

 upon George E. Davenport, in recognition of the services 

 rendered b}' him to the Society by the presentation in 1875 of the 

 valuable Herbarium of Ferns formed by him, and especially of his 

 continued zeal in adding to it many rare and valuable specimens. 



Robert Manning read his Annual Report as Secretary and Li- 

 brarian, which was accepted and referred to the Committee on 

 Publication. 



Adjourned to Saturday, December 18, at 11 o'clock. 



BUSINESS MEETING. 



Saturday, December 18, 1886. 



An adjourned meeting of the Society was holden at 11 o'clock, 

 the President, Henry P. Walcott, in the chair. 



President Walcott addressed the meeting as follows : 



It seems strange that an official announcement of the death of 

 one of the oldest and earliest members of this Society should be 

 in any sense a surprise ; and yet we who, within two short weeks, 

 saw in this hall, busy with the affairs of his best-loved association, 

 a man of eighty-eight years, who had carried the vigor of middle 

 life into extreme old age — we have felt the shock of a sudden 

 parting. Marshall P. Wilder was a member of this Society since 

 1830, president for several years, and member of the Executive 

 Cbmmittee at the time of his death — always a leader here — he 

 was an interested exhibitor and competitor at our latest exhi- 

 bition. A loving admirer of our past, he gladly recognized the 

 merits of the present time, and looked forward contentedly to a 

 future improvement, though it might not be his work. 



