Report of Society's Meetings. 395 



presides, has been increased by 700 volumes. The Book 

 Committee have had a somewhat difficult task in exercising 

 economy while endeavouring to add to the utility and 

 attractions of the library. They have had to avoid load- 

 ing our shelves with books which would be read by few 

 or less than those who propose their purchase — to keep 

 up a supply of books of science, travel, history, biography, 

 &c, and to keep within due limits the demand for 

 works of fi6tion and ephemeral interest; in other words, 

 to make our book room neither a collection of high and 

 dry literature nor a mere second-rate circulating library. 

 Arrangements have been successfully made for the more 

 prompt executions of book orders. There has been a 

 marked increase in the issue of newspapers since they 

 have been rendered acceptable to members, while of 

 magazines there is a larger supply and a corresponding 

 greater demand for them, and the classification of 

 the library enables a reader to get what he wants, 

 so that novels and treatises no longer find their way to the 

 wrong persons. 



The Popular Science Lectures have been main- 

 tained, and continue to attract fair audiences. Our 

 thanks are due to those who have so kindly delivered 

 lectures or aided in their illustration, and I am glad to 

 be able to promise a succession of lectures during next 

 year, which it is hoped will be appreciated by larger 

 audiences. In laying down the office to which you 

 elected me last year, I beg to offer you my thanks for 

 the honour you then paid me, for the indulgence you 

 have shewn me, and also to express my sincere hope 

 that the new year, the forty-seventh of our Society's 

 existence, may bring with it success and prosperity. 



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