ADDRESS 
BY 
Proressor SIR MICHAEL FOSTER, K.C.B., Sc.R.S. 
' PRESIDENT. 
He who until a few minutes ago was your President said somewhere at 
the meeting at Bristol, and said with truth, that among the qualifications 
needed for the high honour of Presidency of the British Association for 
the Advancement of Science, that of being old was becoming more and 
more dominant. He who is now attempting to speak to you feels that he 
is rapidly earning that distinction. But the Association itself is older 
than its President ; it has seen pass away the men who, wise in their gene- 
ration, met at York on September 27, 1851, to found it ; it has seen other 
great men who in bygone years served it as Presidents, or otherwise helped 
» it on, sink one after another into the grave. Each year, indeed, when it 
plants its flag as a signal of its yearly meeting, that flag floats half-mast 
high in token of the great losses which the passing year has brought. 
This year is no exception ; the losses, indeed, are perhaps unwontedly | 
heavy. I will not attempt to call over the sad roll-call ; but I must say a 
word about one who was above most others a faithful and zealous friend of 
the Association. Sir Douglas Galton joined the Association in 1860. From 
1871 to 1895, as one of the General Secretaries, he bore, and bore to the great 
good of the Association, a large share of the burden of the Association’s 
work. How great that share was is perhaps especially known to the 
many men, among whom I am proud to count myself, who during his long 
term of office served in succession with him as brother General Secretary. 
In 1895, at Ipswich, he left the post of General Secretary, but only to 
become TPresident. So long and so constantly did he labour for the good of 
the Association that he seemed to be an integral part of it, and meeting as 
we do to-day, and as we henceforward must do, without Douglas Galton, 
we feel something greatly missing. This year, perhaps even more than in 
other years, we could have wished him to be among us ; for to-day the 
Association may look with joy, not unmixed with pride, on the realisation 
of a project in forwarding which it has had a conspicuous share, on the 
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