1887.] Address. 81 



Our Meetings. — It has been sometimes urged that we should make our 

 meetings more interesting to the general public, and to those amongst our 

 members who do not occupy themselves with cultivating any particular 

 branch of knowledge. I can only say that the remedy is in the hands of the 

 members themselves. The office-holders of the Society do not differ from 

 the members, except that they have, in addition to their duties as mem- 

 bers, undertaken the task of administering its affairs and of conducting 

 through the press the numerous publications of the Society ; they are 

 not men of leisure, but like yourselves have full occupation in their 

 public and private avocations. The means are at hand and have re- 

 ceived the sanction of your Council. On notice given to our Secretaries, 

 they will place on the agenda paper for the evening any one of the 

 numerous subjects within the scope of our Society that any member may 

 wish to bring forward for discussion, and this shall be the subject of con- 

 versation for the meeting, to be entered on after the formal business of 

 the evening has been concluded, and not to form any portion of the 

 records thereof. Thus there will be ample opportunity for any member 

 in an informal way to bring forward any matter on which he desires 

 such information as the members present can afford, or to communicate 

 to us information that appears to him to be of interest. I trust that our 

 after-business conversations may in future form a marked and useful 

 feature of interest in our meetings. I believe that there are none 

 amongst us who cannot add something of novelty and interest to some 

 of the subjects that will arise for discussion and certainly none who are 

 so wise as not to be benefited thereby. Looking back on the history of 

 our Society and analysing the existing list of members, one fact is 

 evident throughout, that we are essentially a Society of amateurs with 

 a few professional men to weld our efforts together, and it is, in a great 

 part, the labours of these amateurs that have built up this Society and 

 made it what it is. We have a past that we may feel proud of, and, 

 though the Societies which have arisen to achieve the objects that we have 

 had before us are both numerous and strong, yet I think that the survey 

 of work done that I have given you this evening may justly make you 

 feel that the parent of all Oriental Societies is neither moribund nor 

 languishing, and that it rests with us individually that this reproach may 

 not fall in our time. 



Survey of the Invertebrata. — In conclusion, I may be permitted 

 to call the attention of all, whether members of this Society or 

 not, to a subject in which I take a deep interest. In doing so 

 I would quote the words of Mr. W. T. Blanford in his address to 

 this Society in 1879 : — " But much as hand-books of Indian Verte- 

 brata are wanted, there is a far greater need of similar aids to 



