4 REPORT — 1897. 



Association with a President, Sir William Dawson, whose name is alike 

 ■well known in Britain and America, and whose reputation is indeed 

 world-wide. We rejoice that we have still among us the pioneer of 

 American geology, who among other discoveries first made us acquainted 

 with the 'Air-breathers of the Coal,' the terrestrial or more properly 

 arboreal Saurians of the New Brunswick and Nova Scotia Coal-measures. 



On our last visit to Canada, in 1884, our place of assembly was Mont- 

 real, a city which is justly proud of her McGill University ; to-day we 

 meet within tlie buildings of another of the Universities of this vast 

 Dominion — and in a city, the absolute fitness of which for such a purpose 

 must have been foreseen by the native Indian tribes when they gave to a 

 small aggregation of huts upon this spot the name of Toronto — 'the place 

 of meetings.' 



Our gathering this year presents a feature of entire novelty and ex- 

 treme interest, inasmuch as the sisfer Association of the United States of 

 America, — still mourning the loss of her illustrious President, Professor 

 Cope, — and some other learned societies, have made special arrangements 

 to allow of their members coming here to join us. I need hardly say how 

 welcome their presence is, nor how gladly we look forward to their taking 

 part in our discussions, and aiding us by interchange of thought. To 

 such a meeting the term ' international ' seems almost misapplied. It may 

 rather be described as a family gathering, in which our relatives more or 

 less distant in blood, but still intimately connected with us by language, 

 literature, and habits of thought, have spontaneously arranged to take 

 part. 



The domain of science is no doubt one in which the various nations of 

 the civilised world meet upon equal terms, and for which no other pass- 

 port is required than some evidence of having striven towards the advance- 

 ment of natural knowledge. Here, on the frontier between the two great 

 English-speaking nations of the world, who is there that does not inwardly 

 feel that anything which conduces to an intimacy between the representa- 

 tives of two countries, both of them actively engaged in the pursuit of 

 science, may also, through such an intimacy, react on the affairs of daily 

 life, and aid in preserving those cordial relations that have now for so 

 many years existed between the great American Republic and the British 

 Islands, with which her early foundations are indissolubly connected ? 

 The present year has witnessed an interchange of courtesies which has 

 excited the warmest feelings of approbation on both sides of the Atlantic. 

 I mean the return to its proper custodians of one of the most interesting 

 of the relics of the Pilgrim Fathers, the Log of the ' Mayflower,' May this 

 return, trifling in itself, be of happy augury as testifying to the feelings of 

 mutual regard and esteem which animate the hearts both of the donors 

 and of the recipients ! 



At our meeting in Montreal the President was an investigator who 

 had already attained to a foremost place in the domains of Physics and 



