NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 229 



one bronze medal should be voted annually by the Society to 

 some resident in the British provinces distinguished for attain- 

 ments in natural science, or for special discoveries or active en- 

 gagement in the same ; and that the silver medals of the Society 

 be presented occasionally to the same class of persons, whether 

 resident in the British provinces or not. 



The Council would now propose to the Society that the silver 

 medal of the Society for the present year be given to Professor 

 Daniel Wilson, LL.D., of Toronto, in acknowledgment of his ser- 

 vices in American ethnology. 



And now your Council would divest themselves of the trust 

 with which they have been honoured, with the fervent hope 

 that the onward steps taken during the past year may be con- 

 tinued and extended in the future, and that each succeeding anni- 

 versary meeting may wituess an increase of prosperity and useful- 

 ness in the Natural History Society of Montreal. 



Abraham De Sola, LL.D., 



Chairman of Councu. 



Montreal, May 18th, 1363. 



REPORT OF THE SCIENTIFIC CURATOR. 



It should be observed that this report refers to a period of time 

 little exceeding six weeks, from the 1st of April, 1863, to the 

 18th of May in the same year. On entering upon my duties 

 one of the first things that struck me was the want of arrange- 

 ment of the specimens in the side cases in the gallery. These 

 contained a confused assemblage of marine shells, Echinodermata 

 (sea urchins, star fishes, etc.), Crustaceans (crabs, lobsters, etc.), 

 Sponges and other marine organisms from the Gulf of the St. 

 Lawrence, and a large series of the land and fresh water shells of 

 Upper and Lower Canada. These were the property of the 

 Geological Survey of Canada, and were collected prii cipally by 

 Messrs. J. Richardson and R. Bell. The cases containing the 

 same, also belonged to the Geological Survey. After several 

 interviews with Sir W. E. Logan, I was requested to go over the 

 whole of this rather large collection and pick out as complete a 

 series as possible, for the Natural History Society. Since that 

 time I have carefully mounted, classified and named the collection 

 thus formed, which will now be available for reference and study. 



