ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS. 17 
And now, gentlemen, I will detain you no longer than is 
necessary to reiterate my acknowledgments of the consideration 
extended to me during the time I have had the honor of filling 
the Presidential Chair, and to express a hope that the interest in 
the work we are engaged in may be sustained, and the progress of 
the Society as satisfactory for the time to come as it has been in 
the time that is past. I cannot, however, vacate the Chair without 
placing upon record my sense of the important services rendered 
to the Society by, and of the obligations we are under to, our 
Honorary Secretaries. It is not too much to say that to the inde- 
fatigable labours of Professor Liversidge and Dr. Leibius are, in a 
very great measure, owing the progress, the usefulness, and the 
popularity attained by the Royal Society. Indeed I think I am 
not exaggerating when I say that the Society is acquiring such a 
status in the public estimation that we may, without presumption, 
look forward to the time when its advice and assistance on 
questions of public interest involving scientific inquiry may be 
Sought by the Government of the Country. To achieve this high 
position should be our constant aim, and thus—although at a 
respectful distance, perhaps—should we be found treading in the 
steps of our great English prototype. 
Before I sit down I desire, on behalf of the Council, to invite 
Special attention to that clause in their report which refers to the 
State of the building fund. It seems to the Council very desirable 
that the deht upon the building should no longer form a charge 
upon the funds of the Society; and it is hoped that, by special 
efforts on the part of its members, my successor in the Chair may 
be able to announce at our next anniversary that the debt has 
been wiped out. 
