BELFAST 



NATURAL HISTORY & PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, 



SESSION i 8 80—8 1. 



2nd November, 1880. 



Professor Purser, President, in the Chair. 



Mr. William H. Patterson, M.R.I.A., gave a description of 

 THE BENN COLLECTION OF ANTIQUITIES. 



The President said they met that evening to open the 

 sixtieth session of that Society. It had been for many years 

 the custom of the President to give at the opening meeting an 

 inaugural address in the form of an account of recent researches 

 in science. On the present occasion they proposed to deviate 

 from that course, and the Council of the Society had sanctioned 

 an arrangement which, he had no doubt, would be very much 

 pleasanter to the audience, and certainly, with the present 

 College engagement, which he had at the beginning of the 

 session, more convenient .to himself; and that arrangement 

 was that they should, on the present occasion, hear from one 

 of their members a description of the valuable collection of 

 antiquities and archaeological specimens which had been pre- 

 sented to them by Mr. George Benn. The member of this 

 Society who was about to give them this description was Mr. 

 William H. Patterson, who, as they all knew, was admirably 

 qualified for the task ; and he (the President) was quite sure 

 they would spend a most interesting evening. Since he had 

 the honour of addressing them at the opening meeting last 

 November, the Society had been enriched by two most valuable 

 gifts. Mr. George Benn, known to them all as the historian 

 of this town, had given to the Society the collection of anti- 



