4 
<a 
e 
20 ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS. 
Professor de Koninck were all returned to Mr. Clarke. It is — 
gratifying to know that by the liberality of our Legislature this — 
invaluable collection of named fossils, together with the remainder 
of Mr. Clarke's collections, and also his scientific library, and the — 
geological map which he had completed before his death—all will — 
now be public property, and will no doubt be displayed in some 
institution convenient of access, for the benefit and instruction of 
the public. Doubtless you are all aware that last week the 
Legislative Assembly voted £7,000 for the purchase of the Clarke 
collection. 
_ Along with his geological labours Mr. Clarke brought his powers 
of keen observation to bear on the meteorology and physical 
geography of the Colony, and contributed much valuable informa 
tion regarding winds and weather, rainfall, earthquakes, and other 
phenomena. In one of his later papers to the Royal Society he 
called attention to a matter which is being culpably neglected i 
Australia, as in some other countries, but which our colonial 
Governments ought to take into serious consideration before 
irreparable mischief is done. The paper to which I allude is | 
entitled “Effects of Forest Vegetation on Climate,” and was read 
Ist November, 1876. In this paper Mr. Clarke brings together 
a valuable mass of evidence to show that destruction of forests 
tends to diminish rainfall and dry up springs; not omitting 
however, some cases where exactly the opposite effects seem © — 
have been observed. But as to these he says:—‘“It seems to me_ 
perfectly clear that there may be other physical causes * * a 
for the local alteration in the water supply.” And again—“ The 
mass of evidence supplied in the present paper from all parts es 
the world must, I humbly conceive, overbear any inference from 
unexamined phenomena brought against that evidence.” F urther | 
oR he says: “It has been my privilege at one time or another 
during my various journeyings to visit the sources of almost every 
important river and stream in this Colony, and it was 0 
without some dread of the future that I have seen the possibility 
eg of the country becoming greatly deteriorated as to its water 
