X PROCEEDINGS OP THE 



in our colonies and dependencies, especially in Australia, 'New 

 Zealand, and East India. 



Our Library has received the usual additions ; the works pre- 

 sented have been numerous and important, and a sum of about 

 £75 has been laid out in the purchase and binding of books. I 

 last year mentioned that the Council were taking measures for 

 printing a general Catalogue. This work, necessarily slow on ac- 

 count of the minutiae of detail requiring careful attention to secure 

 accuracy, is now progressing ; the whole has been arranged and 

 written out for press ; it is in type as far as the letter Gr, and we 

 trust that it will be ready for publication early in autumn. 



In looking over this Catalogue and the shelves of our library, it 

 will be observed that a large proportionate space is occupied by 

 Transactions of scientific bodies and scientific journals more qt less 

 devoted to Natural History. This is, however, a class of works of 

 which we consider it essential for a Society like ours to make as 

 complete a collection as possible. Occupying much room in the 

 shelves, and only wanted for occasional consultation, they are out 

 of the reach of most private libraries, and yet every working 

 naturalist must feel how essential it is for him that there should 

 be some deposit where he can have ready access to them when 

 these occasions occur. The Council have tlierefore always felt it 

 to be in the interest of the Society to be liberal in accepting the 

 proffered intercourse with such of the principal scientific bodies 

 abroad as really include Zoology and Botany in the subjects they 

 treat of; and the practical value of the works so obtained will now 

 be much enhanced by the important indexes preparing by the 

 Eoyal Society. The Linnean Society are in direct exchange of 

 Transactions or Proceedings with no less than eighty -three Acade- 

 mies, Institutes, or Societies at home and abroad, and are in 

 regular receipt, by purchase, exchange, or presentation, of sixteen 

 zoological or botanical periodicals. The comparative value of 

 these works to our Fellows is of course much varied. Few only 

 are devoted exclusively to our own sciences, and in many cases the 

 natural-history papers are so widely scattered in the mass of phy- 

 sical or mathematical subjects, or even of historical and general 

 literature, that they are apt to be entirely overlooked. They are 

 written, moreover, in fourteen different languages, which it can 

 hardly be expected that we should all of us learn, even so far as to 

 speU out with the help of a dictionary. Besides the conventional 

 Latin, the English, French, and German are indeed now essential 

 languages for every true scientific naturalist. With the help of 



