174 peesidbnt's address. 



passages in the last chapter of the work about the scenery of the 

 Tropics, the desolate forests of Tierra del Fuego, the aspects of 

 the ''illimitable ocean;" and what a healthy patriotic tone he 

 manifests where he enthusiastically speaks of the effects in the 

 Southern Hemisphere of the introduction of Christianity and the 

 spread of British influence ! The Treatise which he wrote soon 

 after his return from this voyage, embodying his theory of the 

 formation of Coral lagoon islands or "atolls" was, if I mistake 

 not, one of the works which first, or in a great measure, estab- 

 lished his reputation. His was indeed an industrious life even 

 to the very close, for quite recently he has published works 

 abounding in evidences of close observation and thoroughness in 

 working out the subject he had engaged in. It has often struck 

 me, and I suppose of course many others, how much he has in 

 common with Humboldt. Without comparing the extent, or 

 variety, or profundity, or completeness of his knowledge with 

 that of the great German, there is the same love and appreciation 

 of Nature, the same earnestness in searching into her mysteries, 

 and to a great extent the same power of enlisting the interest of 

 his readers. 



I have heard it said that there are not so many papers now in 

 our Transactions as there used to be. If this be true what is 

 the reason ? Not, I hope, that there are fewer workers amongst 

 the members. It can hardly be that there are not subjects still 

 awaiting treatment. It is true that we have had for some time 

 a valuable collection of Catalogues, but there yet remains work 

 of this kind to be done, and there are many subjects to be treated 

 either generally or locally. In illustration of this I would point 

 to the interesting volume published during the past year by Mr. 

 C. M. Adamson, in which he gives some of the results of his 

 careful observations on birds, extending over many years, and I 

 would mention as especially interesting the account he gave in a 

 previous volume of Prestwick Car, a happy hunting ground, 

 which has now alas been destroyed for a good many years. 

 Next to having the Car itself it is well to have this trustworthy 

 account of some of its aspects and points of interest. There are 

 to be found in these works two chapters bearing on some of the 



