COllHKSI'ONDINCi SOf'IKTIKS. 567 



No sucli quiilifnation is needed before joining a Field CAuh. Anyone fond of 

 Nature in any of her aspects may join freely. Tliere is no iirobation. Mere 

 interest in natural objects suffices, and I take it that the cultivation of such 

 an interest is pre-eminently the niison (I'l-tre, of Field Clubs. What may le. 

 called professional men of science are only aicidenlally members of such clubs. 

 In the early day.s of these associations, when Oxford and Cambridge were the 

 only universities in England, and did but little to popularise Natural Science, 

 the cIuL members were either collectors of natural objects or friends of these 

 collectors who enjoyed sociable rambles with some reputable aim rather than 

 solitary country walks. 



The collectors who at first gathered plants, animals, or fossils merely as 

 curiosities soon became observers as well, and afterwards all-round naturalists 

 of an excellent if somewhat limited kind. Their friends caught the collecting 

 ardour, learnt more or less correctly the names of many plants and animals, and 

 acquiretl by actual experience some knowledge of their ways and habits. In 

 very varied degrees each Field Club had become a group of real outdoor or 

 practical naturalists. Inevitably small sub-groups began to develop, each 

 devoted to some particular department— entomologists, ornithologists, concho- 

 logists, fossil-seekers, and so forth. But still, in the days I am referring to, 

 many remained interested in all branches and truly all-round naturalists. It 

 must be remembered that many things were then new which are now well known. 

 A species, even of fair size, new to science, or at least new to Britain or to some 

 coimty, was not the infrequent or almost impossible prize it has now become. 

 Captures and. finds such as these enheartened the memlvers, sub-group vied 

 with sub-group in the search for rarities, and real study of these was_ fostered 

 amongst the keener and more active. In this way some became specialists or 

 at the least local specialists. Publication naturally followed. At first, perhaps, 

 brief accounts of excursione and presidential addresses, the latter often by 

 local magnates wisely avoiding matters too technical. Next, lists were issued 

 of plants, birds, or molluscs noticed during the season. These lists, as we all 

 know, are valuable but unequally so. There is a tendency nowa<lays to sneer 

 at lists— a mistaken tendency, I think. The construction of lists (good lists, 

 I mean) entails an immense amount of labour of an arid and purely systematic 

 kind, and requires accuracy before all things— accuracy of determination and 

 accuracy of localities. It cannot be said to require much in the way of 

 originality or genius, but it is necessary and useful work all the same, and work 

 without which complete Floras or Faunas could scarcely get compiled. If such 

 lists had been the only outcome of the Field Clubs' energies they would still 

 have justified their existence. 



But the clubs did much more. They all of them probably, at one period or 

 another, have been the means of encouraging and fixing the scientific bent of 

 minds which without their help would have been lost to science. I refer 

 specially to those many remarkable men who, without special training, often 

 without any but the slitrhtest elementary education, have done so much towards 

 tlie advancement of Biology and Geology. Every district has produced excellent 

 naturalists of this tvpe, and in most cases their success has been greatly due to 

 the opportunities given by local Field Clubs. To take as an instance the region 

 in which this meeting is being held, it may be said that without the old- 

 established Tyneside Field Club the names of Thomas Atthey, Albany and John 

 Hancock, George Tate— to mention a few only— would in all probability never 

 have been known. Clubs like these gave the requisite assistance to young men 

 of sagacity and intuition, and started them on a career of fruitful observation 



and discovery. ,. t^- i n r.i i • ii, 



I am anxious to claim the utmost credit m the past for Field Clubs in the 

 performance of functions such a« these. The question now arises : are t^iese 

 functions performed with equally good results at the present time? I think 

 that anyone who has had long and practical acquaintance with the working ot 

 such associations will, on consideration, answer this question in the negative. 



A turning-point in the history of local societies, and more especially of those 

 ,,f the Field Club character, came some forty or fifty years ago. It coincided. I 

 firmly believe with the great increase in the number of subjects taught to the 

 masses of the people and with the establishment of college after college and 



