iJ PRELIMINARY ADDRESS. 



stand, to a great extent, isolated in relation to each other, and look 

 mainly for the appreciation of their labors to their scientific brethren 

 in Europe. If Mr. Logan meets with copper or coal in the course of 

 his geological survey, he communicates it to Canada, and all her 

 journals give "welcome circulation to the fact ; but if his palzeonto- 

 logical researches among our Canadian strata disclose novel truths in 

 relation to the structure of the Graptolite, he goes to Paris or to 

 London with the discovery, and communicates it to his scientific 

 brethren — as Mr. Dawson originally published his Acadian geological 

 observations, — through the medium of English Societies' Transactions. 

 Thus the science of Canada has, as yet, no recognised or independent 

 existence, and its students, if they would place themselves in rapport 

 with those of other lands, can only do so by a sacrifice analogous to 

 the naturalization by which a foreign emigrant attains to the privileges 

 of American citizenship. 



Subjects requiring such a medium of communication cannot be 

 profitably treated of in a popular form. An enquiry into the action 

 of the solar rays on nitrate of silver would doubtless appear 

 sufficiently "caviare to the general," and yet its direct daguerrean 

 photographic results are among the most popular of modern techno- 

 logical processes. The world hails with grateful plaudits the comple- 

 tion of an electric telegraph, forgetful of the indifference and incre- 

 dulity awarded to such preliminary labours as those of Gralvani, of 

 which it is the product. If, therefore, we are to acquire such honors 

 and rewards for ourselves, we must be contented to pursue the pro- 

 cess through all its preliminary stages ; and if we would have an 

 economic and utilitarian science, the first step must be to afford. 

 facilities and encouragement for those who devote themselves to 

 science, not for such utilitarian results, but for its own sake, for its 

 abstract truths, and without a thought of the economic reward- 

 which they lead. 



For such students of science, few as they must of necessity be in 

 a new country like Canada, a medium of communication is required, 

 to furnish a means of intercourse among themselves, as well as of 

 interchange of thought and discovery with the scientific world at 

 large. Such a medium this Journal is designed to afford. II 

 impossible to speak too modestly of its immediate operati 

 Science cannot be called into being by a wave of the editorial gooa 

 quill, nor will a provincial literature rise up to meet the first demai 

 consequent on the discovery of its absence. Yet here, perhaps, 

 may not unfitly apply the trite proverb : "c'est le premier pas i 

 In some of these first steps we must claim the forbearai 



