114 KOYAL SOCIETY FIIOM THE YEAR 1840 TO 190C. 



mentions that his collection of N.S.W. fossils exceed 1,000. 

 When we remember the difficulty of collection we can 

 appreciate the labour involved in gathering so many 

 specimens. Two quotations from the minutes of the Society 

 will give a good idea of the thrilling interest of some of the 

 meetings. 



March 24, 1847. — Read (inter alia) Sir T. Mitchell's 

 account of his journey into the N.W. interior of New South. 

 Wales. 



April 7, 1847. — Read Captain Start's journal of his ex- 

 ploration in the interior of New Holland from South 

 Australia. 



The difference between these two narratives is widely 

 marked, one, that of Sir Thomas Mitchell, being a cheerful 

 story of pleasant wanderings over fine country, while that of 

 Ca^Ji^ain Sturt is a brave man's description of tragic battling 

 with heat, want of watei% iind sickness. In one place the 

 thermometer, graduated to j'27, burst in the shade, while at 

 the breath of the hot wind the leaves fell off the trees. 



The Society also published an account of Leichhardt's 

 overland journey to Port Essington, and a sketch of the plan 

 of the unfortunate traveller's last journey. For that 

 expedition a sum exceeding =£1,.500 was raised by public 

 subscription, and supplemented by a grant of dS 1,000 from 

 the Government of N.S.W. 



Dr. Leichhardt started on this expedition with the warmest 

 wishes of the Australian community. It makes one sorrowful, 

 even now, to think that the heroic band stepped out of sight 

 in the silence of the great lone land, and no seeking has ever 

 been rewarded with even a fragment of knowledge of how 

 they all met their deaths. 



That good friend of the Society, Sir Joseph Hooker, con- 

 tvibutes some papers on the conifere of the island, and credits 

 Mr. R. C. Gunn with the discovery of more than half of the 

 conifere of the whole colony. A most exhaustive paper on 

 the Microscopic life found at the ocean washing the South 

 Pole, was given by Professor Ehrenberg, in Berlin, and then 

 sent by him to the Tasmauian Society, a little incident show- 

 ing that the Society was well and favourably known in the 

 scientific centres of the world. 



A name which was long and honourably associated wdtb 

 the Society was that of Dr. Milligan. The third volume 

 contains a paper by him on the fossils of the country between 

 Hobart and Launceston. All his contributions were marked 

 by much care to obtain scientific accuracy. In 1849 the 

 Tasmanian Society lost its separate existence and became 



