18/1.] THE SECRETARY ON ADDITIONS TO THE MENAGERIE. 37 



tunity of calling the attention of the Meeting to the register of 

 accessions to the Menagerie now lying on the table. In it will be 

 found the English and scientific name, sex, and locality, so far as 

 these are ascertainable, of every vertebrated animal received alive by 

 the Society, together with information as to how it was obtained, 

 whether by presentation, purchase, or otherwise. A corresponding 



register 



is kept of all the deaths that occur in the Society's Gardens, 

 and of the mode in which the bodies are disposed of. This lies also 

 on the table. Both these registers, which are kept at the Super- 

 intendent's office in the Gardens, are, I need hardly say, at all times 

 open to the inspection of the Fellows of the Society, or of any other 

 person interested in them. Moreover, in order to give greater 

 publicity to the list of arrivals, a copy of them is published every 

 week in the ' Field ' newspaper. 



From the earliest days of the Society's existence it has been the 

 practice to keep a register of " arrivals and departures " in the daily 

 journal of " occurrences," as it is termed, prepared by the Super- 

 intendent. Ever since the day when I had the honour of becoming 

 Secretary of the Society, the register of accessions has always been 

 carefully revised every month and an abstract of it printed in the 

 'Proceedings.' This was at first done month by month*; but it 

 was thought afterwards to be more convenient to give the list of 

 additions for the year continuously, so that since 1802 it has been 

 printed entire as an "Appendix'"' to the yearly volume of 'Pro- 

 ceedings.' At the same time it has been my constant practice (as 

 those here, who have so often had to listen to me, must be fully 

 aware) to bring before the scientific meetings such notices as seemed 

 to be requisite of all the more remarkable additions to the Society's 

 collection, so as to call immediate attention to every accession of 

 special interest. I have likewise edited and published four editions 

 of the list of Vertebrated Animals in the Society's Gardens, and am 

 now engaged in preparing a fifth edition, which will contain a register 

 of every accession received up to the close of last year, and thus form 

 a complete record of all the animals that have been living in the 

 Society's Gardens during the past ten years. 



I have been induced to trouble the meeting with these remarks, 

 because in the last number of the 'Annals of Natural History 'f a 

 Fellow of the Society has assured the public that no proper record 

 is kept of the living animals received in the Society's Gardens. How 

 such a statement can have been made in the face of the facts above 

 stated, I am not able to explain. 



Mr. Howard Saunders exhibited a series of skins of birds of the 

 genus Aquila, and made the following remarks on them : — 



" Before commencing the exhibition of this formidable array of 



* See P. Z. S. 1859, p. 212, where the first of these lists (for May of that year") 

 is given. ' ' 



t Ann. Nat. Hist. ser. 3. vol. vii. p. 15. 



