vi Proceedings of the South African Philosophical Society. 
Cape Town ; Hon. Dr. W. Berry, The Speaker, House of Assembly ; 
J. A. Masson, Hsq., Surveyor-General, Natal; W. Ossorn, Hsq., 
Public Library, Durban; J. A. Francis, Eisq., Durban; D. Don, 
Esq., Durban. 
A suggestion was made by the Sucretary that each member 
reading a paper before the Society should write a summary for the 
press, so that country members might get better information of the 
Meetings. 
The CHAIRMAN thought this a subject with which the Council 
might deal. 
Dr. Git described the work which was being done in spectro- 
scopy at the Royal Observatory. He gave an account of the new 
spectroscope which had been designed by himself and erected by the 
liberality of Mr. Maclean. 
‘Mr. ScLaTER gave an account of the discovery of an ancient stone 
in excavations carried on in Adderley Street. He had deciphered 
the inscription as follows :— 
‘Charles Cle chiefe command of Palsgrave Elizabeth and Hope 
arrived ye XXIIII. June and dep. for Bantam ye XX. July 1619. 
Thomas Brockendon, Cape merchant of the Palsgrave.” 
He had communicated with Mr. Ravenstein on the subject, who 
had referred the matter to Mr. W. Foster, of the India Office, from 
whom he had received a letter stating that ‘on looking through the 
records of the Hast India Company he found that the fleet in ques- 
tion sailed from the Thames in March, 1619. The Hope had made 
several previous voyages, but the Palsgrave (1,083 tons) and Hliza- 
beth (978 tons) were new ships built by the Company in the previous 
year. The chief was Commander Charles Clevenger (Cle of the 
inscription), who hoisted his flag in the Palsgrave. At the Cape 
they seemed to have met the Lesser James, homeward bound. It 
was customary for the Company’s sailors (as also the Dutch) to cut 
such inscriptions for the information of succeeding ships, and the 
particulars thus obtained were continually repeated in the letters 
home. At times letters were buried and inscriptions engraved near 
at hand giving intelligence where they might be found. Sir Thomas 
Roe, on his way to India in 1615, had an inscription cut recording 
his embassy, and indeed there must be many such buried stones in 
Cape Town and its vicinity. 
Mr. ScuaterR also exhibited the photograph of the skull of a 
gigantic lemur which had been sent to him from Madagascar. For 
the skull itself the price of £8,500 was asked. 
The CHAIRMAN gave a short account of underground water in the 
Transvaal. Very little had been done in South Africa with regard 
