ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. XXVll 



published works have constantly shown the important aid that geo- 

 logy has received from the cautious inductions derived from the 

 study of palaeontology. 



After the other proceedings had been completed, and the Officers 

 and Council had been elected, the President proceeded to address 

 the Meeting. 



ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT, 



SIR CHARLES LYELL. 



Gentlemen, — You will have heard in the Report of your Council, 

 that the finances of the Society continue to be in a flourishing state. 

 In the course of the past year we have had to lament, as usual in so 

 large a body, the death of several of our Members, and some of 

 these it will be my duty more particularly to mention, as having di- 

 stinguished themselves by original investigations, or by using the 

 influence of their station or fortune in promoting the progress of 

 Geology. 



Christian VIII. King of Denmark was enrolled a Fellow of 

 this Society in 1822. Two years before that time, when travelling 

 in Italy, he had witnessed an eruption of Vesuvius, and had read a 

 description of it to the Academy of Sciences at Naples ; a communi- 

 cation published in their Transactions, and afterwards reprinted in 

 Leonhard's Journal for 1822. 



From an early age he had taken a lively interest in the progress of 

 natural history, and when Crown Prince, formed at Copenhagen, at his 

 own expense, a magnificent collection of shells, the number of species 

 being estimated at not less than 12,000, exclusive of fossils. When I 

 visited the Danish capital in 1835, he placed this museum and his 

 library at my disposal, and I had then an opportunity of knowing 

 that he kept up an acquaintance with the new species added from 

 year to year to his cabinet, then in charge of an able conchologist, 

 Dr. Beck, and that he was very desirous of making his museum 

 useful to all zoologists. Nor was he inattentive to the points of con- 

 troversy then agitated respecting the geology of Denmark. He 



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