PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL GEO- 

 GRAPHIC SOCIETY 



ANNOUNCEMENTS 



Regut.ar Meetings : 



December 5. — "The Work of the Weather 

 Bureau." Dr Willis L. Moore. 



December 19. — "The Woik of the Signal 

 Office, War Department." Gen. A. W. Greely. 



January 2. — Annual meeting. Reports and 

 elections. 



January 16. — "The Work of the Hydro- 

 graphic Office, Navy Department." Com- 

 mander W. H. H. Southerland. 



January 30. — "The Work of the Office of 

 Experiment Stations, Agricultural Depart- 

 ment." Dr A. C True. 



February 13. — "The Work of the Census 

 Office." Hon. William R. Merriam. 



February 27.— " The Work of the Naval Ob- 

 servatory." Capt. Charles H. Davis. 



March 13.— "The Work of the Geological 

 Survey." Hon. Charles D. Walcott. 



March 27.— "The Work of the Library of 

 Congress." Hon. Herbert Putnam. 



Popular Lectures : 



December 12. — "Argentina — Present and Fu- 

 ture." E, L. Corthell, C. E. (Illustrated.) 



January 9. — "The Turk and His Rebellious 

 Subjects." Mr William E- Curtis. (Illus- 

 trate. 1.) 



January 23. — "The Tragedy of St Pierre." 

 Mr George Kennan. (Illustrated.) 



Provisional arrangements have also been 

 made for lectures on Colombia and the Isth- 

 mian Canal; America Before the Advent of 

 Man ; The Geographic Distribution of Insanity 

 in the United States ; Russia of Today' (by 

 l'aul du Chaillu), and a lecture by Mr John 

 Muir. 



The Lenten Course of five lectures will be 

 delivered in Columbia Theater, F street, near 

 Twelfth, at 4.20 o'clock, on Wednesday after- 

 noons of February n, 18, 25, and March 4, ir. 



The subject of this course and the speakers 

 assigned for the special topics will be an- 

 nounced in a later program. 



November 7, 1902. — The first regular meeting 

 of the Society for the year 1902-1903 was held 

 in the Assembly Hall of the Cosmos Club at 

 8 o'clock p. m., Acting President W J McGee, 



LL. D., in the chair. Hon. William F. Wil- 

 longhby, Treasurer of Porto Rico, delivered 

 an address on "Some of the Administrative 

 and Industrial Problems of Porto Rico." An 

 abstract of the address follows : 



In assuming the responsibility of the gov- 

 ernment of Porto Rico the American author- 

 ities found themselves confronted with two 

 distinct but yet related tasks: (1) To endow 

 the newly acquired possession with political 

 institutions and systems of law at once con- 

 forming to American ideals of individual lib- 

 erty and political justice and yet adapted to 

 the peculiar local conditions existing and the 

 character of the inhabitants, and (2) to bring 

 about a developmentof the industrial resourct s 

 of the island. 



The general policy of the United States has 

 been (1) to administer the island solely with a 

 view to its own interest, and in no way as a 

 source of revenue to the federal treasury, and 

 (2) to endow the island with the largest meas- 

 ure of local self-government that it is fitted to 

 enjoy. 



In carrying out the first part of this policy 

 not the slijhtest effort has been made by the 

 United States to recoup itself for expenditures 

 incurred during the war resulting in the an- 

 nexation of the dependencies nor the expense 

 subsequently incurred for their administration 

 and development while undermilitary govern- 

 ment ; but it has been provided that in the 

 future, or for an indefinite time to come, all 

 receipts in the way of customs duties or excise 

 taxes collected in the island shall be turued 

 into the insular treasury instead of the federal 

 treasury. In consequence of this provision, 

 the island enjoys an enormous advantage over 

 what it would have were it a state or organized 

 territory of the Union. Over two-thirds of. 

 the revenue of the island of Porto Rico is ob- 

 tained from these two sources of excise taxes 

 and customs duties, which in the United States 

 would be covered into the general treasury. 

 While thus foregoing the receipt of any reve- 

 nue from the island, the United States not 

 only exercises a general care of Porto Ricau 

 interests in the way of military and naval pro- 

 tection, but performs at its own expense such 

 industrial and commercial services as the 

 maintenance of light-houses and harbor buoys, 

 a marine hospital service, a weather bureau, 

 etc., and has also recently established an agri- 

 cultural experiment station on the island, and 

 contemplates conducting very important ex- 

 periments and investigations for the develop- 

 ment of the agricultural resources. 



