31 



1st December^ i8g6. 



Professor J. D. Everett, f.r.s., d.c.l., in the Chair. 



Report of Mr. A. Tate, m.i.c.e., 

 Delegate to Conference of British Association^ i8g6. 



Mr. Alexander Tate first submitted his report of some 

 matters which were considered at the meetings in Liverpool. 

 He asked the special attention of the Society to two schemes 

 affecting the working of societies like theirs which were 

 discussed at considerable length at those meetings. The object 

 of the first of those schemes was to promote the formation of 

 district unions of natural history societies. It was drawn up 

 and submitted by Mr. George Abbott, General Secretary of the 

 South-Eastern Union of Scientific Societies, and it proposed the 

 division of the United Kingdom into fifteen or twenty districts, 

 in each of which the societies should be grouped together for 

 mutual aid, counsel, and work, any existing unions to be taken 

 advantage of and not disturbed, each union to have an annual 

 congress, held year by year in different towns, and to be 

 attended by delegates and members from the affiliated societies. 

 A further suggestion was that each local society should have a 

 corresponding member in each village in its district to look 

 after its interests and forward in every way its objects. The 

 working of the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union had been very 

 successful, one important result being the training of a number 

 of skilful workers in the various departments of natural science. 

 What had been done in regard to the Irish Union of Natural 

 History iSocieties was clearly stated by Professor Johnston, the 

 delegate from Dublin Natural History Society, and was corrobo- 



