Vlll PRESIDENT S ADDRESS. 



forgotten if we are fairly to appraise tlieir value. I refer to the 

 steady accumulation of facts — items of real knowledge — which 

 the accurate observers in our Society and others of like kind are 

 making. It is only at rare nitcrvals that men of genius enrich 

 us by enunciating some new law which exceptional insight and 

 laborious work has enabled them to discover, such, for instance, 

 as that of evolution, the greatest generalisation of modern times. 

 But the humblest student who concentrates his efforts, and takes 

 ordinary precautions to avoid wrong conclusions, has it in his 

 power to definitely add to our knowledge in relation to some 

 created thing if he will simply set the ol)ject clearly before his 

 mind and work definitely for its attainment. These isolated 

 facts, if sufficiently vouched for, and recorded in some enduring 

 way, will one day have real value for other observers, and 

 may contribute bricks for some future worker of the higher class 

 to build with ; help to confute some error, or aid some truth, or 

 assist in the illustration of some newly-found law. Every 

 working geologist may, by careful and repeated observations in 

 some limited field, distinctly help his fellow-workers. So, too, 

 may the botanist and the zoologist, whether entomology or 

 ornithology or the lowest forms of life engage his attention. 



Among the benefits which societies like ours confer must 

 be included the giving to all who h'equent our meetings the 

 power, equal to a new sense, of perceiving the infinitely great in 

 the infinitely little. The mass of mankind are entirely 

 unacquainted with the marvels by which they are surrounded ; 

 they know nothing of the wonders enclosed in the limits ol 

 organisms so minute as to be visible only under the microscope, 

 and with hundi'eds of which the members of natural history 

 societies have a more or less familiar acquaintance. In this 

 way, little by little, the student gets to know more of living 

 things. He sees strange histories where the uninstructed sees 

 only a blank page. Nothing created is to such a man without 

 interest ; for whether he has investigated it or not he knows 

 by analogy that it is worth investigation; " everywhere he sees 

 significances, harmonies, laws, chains of cause and eflect 



