xvi REPORT OF THE COUNCIL, 1924-25. 
(h) The Council received from the Organising Committees of Sections 
A and B a resolution expressing the hope that the Council would see its 
way to include German men of science in the list of foreign guests for the 
Southampton Meeting. The Council, after full consideration, found it 
inexpedient to take action on this resolution. 
VII. The Council welcomed a proposal that a fund should be collected 
by voluntary contribution from members who attended the Toronto 
Meeting from Great Britain, etc., for the purpose of making a presentation 
to the University of Toronto in commemoration of the meeting. The 
fund so collected amounted to £196. It was decided, after consultation 
with Sir Robert Falconer, President of the University, to propose to 
the University that the income from the fund should be applied to the 
presentation of two bronze medals each year, to selected students in 
pure and applied science respectively, and that any available balance 
should be expended upon presents of books to the students. 
VIII. The Council circulated an appeal to agricultural and kindred 
societies and institutions in Great Britain to exchange their publications 
more freely with similar institutions in North America. 
IX. The Council received from some of the Corresponding Societies 
information as to demands made upon them for the payment of income 
tax upon revenue from invested funds, which had previously been 
exempted from taxation, coupled with requests that the Association should 
take action to avert these demands. The Association itself, when claiming 
the refund of taxation as usual in 1924, was informed that, while its claim 
was then allowed, future exemption might be reconsidered. The Council 
instituted a wide inquiry of corresponding and other societies, which 
revealed that such demands were being made unsystematically, and that 
the payment of tax would in many instances cripple the resources and work 
of the societies. The Council received co-operation and support from 
many quarters, and especially from the Society of Antiquaries, which 
instituted an inquiry of societies in union with itself. After full considera- 
tion by a committee of the Council and the officers of the Association and 
the Society, a deputation representative of both bodies and a number of 
other institutions waited upon the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, 
who sympathetically received a statement of the present and former 
positions of the societies with reference to taxation, and specific proposals 
for their exemption in future. Discussion followed between a committee 
of the deputation and the Chairman and other officers of the Inland 
Revenue, with regard to a possible definition of societies which should 
be exempted. H.M. Treasury, however, subsequently proposed that an 
agreed test case should be carried to the Courts, the costs, independently 
of the decision, to fall upon the public funds ; and the Council, for their 
part, agreed to this course. 
X. The Council, when appointing sectional recorders and secretaries 
for the Southampton Meeting, brought into operation a standing order 
that members of the Association should not, in general, hold either of 
these offices for a period exceeding five years (excluding, however, the 
year of an overseas meeting). 
XI. The Council have received reports from the General Treasurer 
throughout the year. His accounts have been audited and are presented 
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