PEESIDENl's ADDRESS ON THE DEATH OF PROF. J. R. KINAHAN, M.D. 33 



more correct acquaintance with, these humble and obscure organisms, 

 occupying so lowly a corner in the great domain of the vegetable kingdom. 



The following gentlemen were admitted Ordinary Members of the 

 Society: — Edward H. Kinahan, Esq., Merrion-square ; and Thomas W. 

 Kinahan, Esq., St. Kilda, Sandycove. 



The Meeting then adjourned till February. 



FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1863. 



William Andrews, M. R. I. A., President, in the Chair. 



The minutes of the preceding meeting having been read and signed, 

 the President made the following observations : — 



The painful duty has devolved upon me this evening to record the 

 sad loss we have sustained in the death of our late Honorary Secretary, 

 Professor John Robert Kinahan, M. D. Snatched from us in the prime 

 of life and in the maturity of his powers, and in the midst of his useful 

 but too short career, we must all deeply deplore the blank made in this 

 Society, as well as the loss to natural science in general. 



I have no account of the early career of our departed friend, 

 beyond that his boyish tendencies were directed to those pursuits in 

 which he subsequently so distinguished himself, and that with credit he 

 obtained his degree in arts and medicine. Of this Society he was 

 elected a member on the 7th of March, 1851; but, owing to the close 

 application necessary for his medical studies, he did not give his first 

 paper until June, 1852. This was "On Gasterosteus leiurus, the 

 smooth-tailed Stickleback, and on the Fishes of the River Dodder." His 

 views were so original, and his observations so interesting, on the habits 

 of the Gasterosteus and its mode of nidification, that the paper has been 

 copied into the third edition of Yarrell's "British Eishes." He also 

 soon thereafter first advanced his views with regard to the abnormal 

 conditions of Ferns, and the varieties they assume, which subject he con- 

 tinued in several papers. His notes on the autumnal song of birds and 

 their habits, and those of his repeated rambles among the Cheiropidae, or 

 Bats, of which family he brought to light several new to our Fauna, 

 were the result of repeated and untiring observations. So versatile, in- 

 deed, was his mind on natural history subjects, that night and day his 

 inquiring observations were directed to every branch of the science, as 

 his copious notices throughout our " Proceedings" testify. "Whether 

 light, popular, or abstruse, all were to him of interest. 



On the retirement of James R. Dombrain, Esq., who had so zea- 

 lously filled the office of Honorary Secretary for many years, Dr. Kinahan 

 was elected to that post on the 8th of November, 1853. At the termi- 

 nation of the year 1854 he embarked for Australia, in a medical capa- 

 city on board the vessel in which he sailed, and which subsequently 

 proceeded to Peru. His object was chiefly to extend his knowledge in 



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