ANNIVEKSARY MEETING W0LLA8T0N DONATION FtTND. 



Award of the AVollaston Donation Fund. 



The President then presented the Balance of the Proceeds of the 

 "VVollaston Donation Pund to Mr. J. Starkie Gardner, P.G.S., and 

 addressed him as follows : — 



Mr. Starkie Gardner, — 



The small number of students and the paucity of memoirs seems 

 to indicate that fossil botany is one of those subjects of which 

 the difficulties repel rather than fascinate the neophyte. If per- 

 haps these are in some respects less formidable in the plant- 

 remains of the earlier Tertiary period, if, in studying them, recent 

 throws some light on fossil botany, yet the practical difficulties 

 of obtaining, developing, and preserving specimens are so great that 

 no little ardour and patience are demanded from one who devotes 

 himself to the subject. Por years this has been your special 

 work : after thoroughly exploring the flora of the Eocene Tertiaries 

 on the coast of Hampshire and in the Isle of Wight, you are now, 

 and liave for some time been, engaged in communicating to us the 

 fruits of your labours through the medium of the Palseontographical 

 Society, thereby earning the thanks of students. Your researches 

 also of late years have been extended to Antrim, Mull, and even 

 Iceland, and their results cannot fail to be of the highest interest 

 in regard to the age of these floras, and their relation to those 

 which occur in the Hampshire district. In recognition of past 

 and in aid of future work, the Council have awarded to you the 

 balance of the WoUaston Pund, which I have much pleasure m 

 handing to you. 



Mr. Gardner, in reply, said : — 



Mr. President, — 



I beg to return my thanks for the honour the Council have done 

 me in placing the balance of tliis fund at my disposal. The amount 

 of leisure I am able to command has not permitted me to contribute 

 towards the advancement of geology in this country in anything like 

 the same proportion as my professional brethren ; but I think I may 

 fairly claim to yield to none in my devotion to its i)ursuit. The 

 subject I somewha;t unfortunately monopolize is one of such magni- 

 tude that, at the best, very many years of such work as I am able 

 to devote to it must elapse before even a first general impression of 

 the composition of our Eocene floi-as can be published. I am, 

 however, so deeply impressed with tlie importance of the study that 

 I am prepared to sacrifice much in order that the time required may 

 not be unduly prolonged. I am convinced tliat. in addition to the 

 ordinary botanical, paloeontological, and evolutionary in terest attacliing 

 to it, it will be found to present the solution of many problems as to 

 the former relative positions of land and sea and tlie climatic changes 



