476 CONFERENCE OF DELEGATES 
concerned, no systematic attempt to compile a list appears to have been 
made, but in the case of geology an inquiry was instituted some years ago 
by the Geological Society among local geologists and learned societies, with 
the result that a valuable though incomplete list was drawn up. In order 
to make the list as complete as possible, the Association is in a position to 
call to its assistance (a) its Corresponding Societies and their delegates ; 
(6) the specialist learned societies; (c) officials of local museums and 
libraries ; and (d) teachers in universities, colleges, and in public, grammar, 
secondary and technical schools. The information likely to be furnished 
by local societies must be supplemented by appeal to other institutions, for 
a glance at the map showing the location of our Corresponding Societies 
reveals the fact that there are numerous and extensive areas not covered by 
them. ‘The delegates here present are invited to urge their Societies to 
begin (if they have not already begun) the compilation of a list of sites and 
objects of exceptional botanical, zoological or geological character within 
their area, and to communicate their results at frequent intervals to the 
central office of the Association. The reference list which will thus be 
compiled will be available for consultation as each scheme of planning is 
notified ; and where there is doubt as to the best policy to pursue, the advice 
of experts on the panel already drawn up for the purpose by the Council 
can be sought. 
It is desirable here to refer to two aspects of preservation which are in 
some measure conflicting, as was very clearly shown in the Report of the 
National Park Committee of 1931. Already some beautiful areas—we 
could wish that there were more—have been preserved for the full access of 
the public. Already, also, certain areas are under protection as nature 
reserves—and a nature reserve, whether for flora or for fauna, implies the 
prohibition, or at least the close control, of public access. Now, with the 
provision of nature reserves as such the Town and Country Planning Act 
is not concerned, and it is not advice as to nature reserves that is invited 
from the Association by the Ministry in connection with that Act. It is true 
that the communication on the question of planning which the Association 
addressed to the Societies last year has brought some answers relating to 
potential reserves ; and the possibility that planning of an area in such 
manner that it might become a nature reserve would naturally weigh strongly 
with any scientific body. But I am not directly concerned with nature 
reserves at this moment ; they offer ground for discussion, as, for instance, 
between the relative value of either a large number of small reserves or 
a small number of large ones ; I am not proposing to argue that question 
now. 
Reverting therefore to our specific consideration, we have to ask how far 
we ought to attempt to put forward our requests for preservation on scientific 
grounds ? There cannot be any large number of cases in which protection 
could be demanded on scientific grounds and no other. But scientific 
interest in this connection is rarely dissociated from some measure of natural 
beauty, and the cases in which scientific arguments might be used to support 
esthetic and other arguments must be numerous—the question is, how 
numerous ? 
To illustrate this question, I will take an area in which the British 
Association happens to be deeply interested—that surrounding Downe in 
Kent, where, as you know, the Association, thanks to the generosity of 
Sir Buckston Browne, owns and maintains Darwin’s House as a national 
memorial. Here is a district still purely countrified, within 16 miles of 
London Bridge, and on the very edge of suburban development in its most 
rampant form. In justice to the authorities of the urban district to which 
