1869.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 17 



unsatisfactory way ? And are we justified in expecting that our Journal 

 will be appreciated, if such be continued ? But beyond this, the contri- 

 butors to the Journal themselves never knew when their papers would 

 appear; there often was no rule observed as to priority of contribution, 

 giving a claim to priority of publication. The practice had grown up of 

 merely announcing to the meetings of the Society the receipt of papers, 

 of which only the titles were given, and nothing more w T as heard of them, 

 until they appeared in the Journal, perhaps years afterwards, or were 

 possibly returned to their authors. During the past year I rejoice to be 

 able to announce to you that by the strenuous exertions of your Secre- 

 taries, much has been done to remedy these defects. No one here can be 

 more painfully or practically aware of the immense difficulty of providing 

 for the punctual appearance of the Journal and Proceedings, than I am 

 myself. These difficulties are the greater, because the result depends 

 not on the efforts of an individual bat on those of many : the printer, 

 the artist, the lithographer, &c. ; delays may arise from each and all of 

 these, and in addition there are climatal difficulties which can scarcely 

 be foreseen, and sometimes even, if foreseen, can scarcely be guarded 

 against. But while admitting all these, we felt the delay was not in- 

 surmountable, and determined not again to ask the Society to believe 

 it unavoidable. Since I have had the honour of taking the chair, the 

 Proceedings have always been issued to you before the ensuing 

 meeting, the illustrations have always accompanied the paper to which 

 they referred, and the completion of the volume for the year, with title 

 and index, was in your hands, before the close of December. This 

 volume is larger, and has more illustrations than preceding ones. The 

 numbers of the Journal have also all appeared ; of the first Part, two 

 completing the issue for the past year, and of the Physical Science 

 Part, foiir numbers with index, contents, title, &c, have all been 

 issued before the close of the year, although the first number had 

 only been commenced in March. An extra number was also issued 

 containing Mr. Theobald's Catalogue of Reptiles, which had been 

 actually in the press for three years; and meteorological Reports were 

 published, extending over a period of nearly two years. 



Further, there has not been a single paper of any kind submitted 

 to the Society for publication, which has not either been read in full, 



