Proceedings of Royal Society of Canada. 149 
efforts, in the way of trying to push forward the boundaries 
of the known or to clear the way for discoveries by others, 
but that we were also expected to bring in our hands the 
offerings of co-workers with whom we were more or less 
closely associated in our respective districts. For these 
reasons I was led to regard your choice of a president from 
the extreme eastern part of our long and wide country as a 
choice deliberately made in pursuance of a wise and safe 
policy, often referred to in our deliberations, that aims not 
only at recognizing every department of literature and 
science, and every form of intellectual activity, but also as 
offering, to the fullest possible extent, fair representation 
and encouragement to every province and every part of the 
Dominion. I trust that this policy, and the principle upon 
which it is based, will long continue to guide the delibera- 
tions of the members and council of this society in the 
selection of officers, so far as compatible with efficiency, and 
‘of its several sections, in the nomination of members. 
“These remarks naturally suggest a fact of another kind, 
viz., that a large amount of the executive business during 
the year, when the Society is not in session, and when it is 
inconvenient for distant members of council to attend, has 
necessarily to be performed by a small number of those 
who reside within convenient distances of Ottawa or Mont- 
real, Responsibilities and labour thus devolve upon the 
few that should otherwise be spread over the many. This 
is especially the case in regard to the publication of tran- 
sactions, which involves a serious amount of irksome labour. 
If we, the distant members, cannot lighten it any, it may 
be permissible to say that while not insensible of the un- 
avoidable disadvantages under which we labour, and which 
often limit our participation in the Society’s operations in 
many ways, we yet have but one feeling in regard to the 
laborious and thoroughly efficient manner in which, 
through many difficulties, the work of publication has been 
carried on. We are grateful for this to our active members 
in Montreal and Ottawa, whose labours are apt to be over- 
looked, and especially to our active secretary, who is styled 
