182 Reports and Proceedings — 



improvement in the state of the Society's affairs, to which they had 

 the satisfaction of calling attention last year, although they regretted 

 that they could not announce any increase in the total number of 

 Fellows. The number elected during the year was 41, and the 

 total accession was 46 ; while the losses by death, resignation, etc, 

 amounted to 48, making an actual decrease of 2 in the number of 

 Fellows. Nevertheless the number of contributing Fellows was in- 

 creased by 2. The Balance-sheet showed an excess of Income over 

 Expenditure during the year of £390 5s. ^d. The Council's Report 

 further announced the awards of the various Medals and of the pro- 

 ceeds of the Donation Funds in the gift of the Society. 



In presenting the Wollaston Gold Medal to Mr. J. W. Hulke, 

 F.R.S., the President addressed him as follows : — 



Mr. Hulke, — It is a very pleasant duty which I am called upon to perforin in 

 presenting you with the Wollaston Medal, as a recognition of your great services 

 to the study of Vertebrate Palaeontology. A member of that honoured profession 

 which has given to Geology — and especially to the biological side of our science — 

 so many diligent and accurate students, you have succeeded, in spite of the labours 

 and anxieties incident to a very active career, devoted to the alleviation of human 

 suffering and the training of others for the same duties, in finding time for very 

 valuable researches among those wonderful forms of Reptilian life which charac- 

 terize the Mesozoic period. Your hardly-earned vacations have been spent in the 

 search of fossil bones among the mud-flats of Dorsetshire and the sandy cliffs of 

 the Isle of Wight ; and in this way you have acquired an exceptional amount of 

 knowledge concerning the exact geological horizons and the mode of occurrence 

 of the fossils you have so admirably described. As by successive discoveries you 

 have been able to add new details to your restoration of the bony framework of 

 Jguanodon, you must have experienced a joy akin to that of Creation ! But though 

 you are best known to the world by those osteological researches, those who, like 

 myself, have had the happiness of being associated witli you in the work of this 

 Society, have discovered how wide is the knowledge, how catholic the sympathy, 

 and how keen the interest with which you follow all the manifold developments of 

 our Science. 



Mr. Hulke, in reply, said :— Mr. President, — I cannot find words adequately 

 to express how highly I value the distinction which the Council has this day, by 

 your hands, conferred upon me. The pleasure I experience in receiving it is in no 

 small degree increased by the words of approbation which have fallen from your 

 own lips. The Wollaston Medal is so truly great a prize, and the work I have 

 done to merit it has appeared to me so little in comparison with that accomplished 

 by the long roll of illustrious men on whom in past time it has been bestowed, 

 that I have fancied that (as occurred to Sir Philip Egerton on a similar occasion) 

 in awarding it to myself the Council may also have desired to mark the recog- 

 nition of the labours of those who, whilst not devoting the chief part of their 

 time and energy to the culture of that branch of Natural Science for the advance- 

 ment of which our Society exists, yet endeavour in their leisure hours to do what 

 in them lies to add to our common stock of knowledge. To you, Sir, to the 

 Council, and to the Fellows, I tender my warmest thanks. 



The President then presented the Balance of the Proceeds of the 

 Wollaston Donation Fund to Mr. Benjamin N. Peach, F.G.S., and 

 addressed him as follows : — 



Mr. Peach, — In addition to your services to science as an officer of the Geological 

 Survey of Scotland — and how important those services have been every geologist 

 in recent years has had an opportunity of judging — you have, in conjunction with 

 your colleague and friend, Mr. Home, devoted your holidays to arduous labour in 

 studying the geology of the Orkneys and Shetlands. Both the glacial and the 

 volcanic phenomena of those islands have been admirably elucidated by your joint 

 researches. But besides your work in the field you have devoted much attention 

 to palseontological investigations ; and your discoveries concerning the nature of 



