2 
Secondly.—How can a Paper in which I suggest how the 
collection of animals living in the Gardens of the Society may 
be made more useful to scientific visitors and to the progress 
of zoology, be said not to be a subject suitable for presentation 
at a Scientific Meeting? for such a Paper is decidedly in ac- 
cordance with the special object for which the Society was 
established—that of affording the means of studying the 
living animals. 
I cannot.suppose that the Committee, by passing such a 
resolution, intended to impose an insult on one of the oldest, if 
not the oldest living Fellow of the Society, who has been 
many years on the Council and Publication and Garden Com- 
mittees, and, as the Secretary observes, “‘ a Vice-President of 
the Society,” and who has more than once performed the 
duties of Secretary during the absence of the paid Secretaries, 
and whose previous communications have always been accepted 
and form a part of the publications of the Society. 
But it appears to me that the Secretary forgets that the 
Society is primarily formed for the use of the Fellows, and 
secondly for the instruction of the public, and that the Fel- 
lows employ the paid officers and servants of the Society to 
carry on the business of the Fellows and to afford them faci- 
lities—and that the “ credit of the Society” is better in their 
keeping, especially if such statements as I have disproved are. 
to be printed by the Secretary, and not contradicted by the 
Fellow aggrieved. 
Iam, 
My Lords and Gentlemen, 
Your obedient Servant, 
J. E. GRAY. 
Zoological Society of London, 
11 Hanover Square, London, W., 
16th March, 1871. 
Srr,—In answer to your letter of March 13, 1871, I am 
directed by the Council to point out to you that, by the Bye- 
laws of the Society, the arrangement of the Agenda for the 
Scientitic Meetings is intrusted to the Publication Committee. 
The Council do not doubt that the Publication Committee 
exercised their best discretion in reference to the paper alluded 
to in your letter; and though they regret that the decision of 
the Committee should have caused you any annoyance, they 
do not think it expedient to interfere with it. 
The Council direct me to add, with reference to the registers 
