39 : PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS. 
Tt is true that at present the Royal Society’s rules are so liberal 
that a visitor need seldom be debarred from attending its meetings, 
yet increased facilities might be granted to a certain number of 
properly accredited members of external Societies. 
Another way in which the Royal Society and other scientific 
Societies at home could render us material help is by giving us 
assistance in the publication of our papers. Too often a paper 
read before a colonial Society is practically not published at all 
outside of the particular Colony in which it is read and printed. 
Although the publications of the colonial Societies are usually 
distributed to the principal Societies and Journals outside of the 
Colonies, yet but few people see them. The book is placed on the 
library table or shelves, and is perhaps just glanced at by one or 
two ; whereas if abstracts of the papers which it contains, or even 
their titles, were to be more regularly inserted in the publications 
of the home Societies, more use would be made of the work done 
in the Colonies and America. In the case of the more valuable 
papers, it might be desirable to have the whole of the contributions 
published in the Journal of some home Society ; arrangements 
could readily be made so that the paper should appear simul- 
taneously at home and in the Colony. Any such recognition 
would, I am sure, do a great deal to further the advancement of 
science in the Colonies. 
Now-a-days few have the time to unearth books in a large 
library ; to reach the person for whom it is intended, the paper 
must be placed in his hands, or otherwise closely brought under 
his notice. 
In the same way it might be arranged that papers written in 
England, America, and elsewhere, upon matters interesting in the 
Colonies, might be simultaneously read and published by the 
Colonial Societies. 
After a paper has been published (i.¢., technically) in the 
Colonies, although very few have seen or heard it, no other scien- 
tific Society according to the present custom can pay any attention 
