342 JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 
The President stated that the Society had offered its medals 
and money prizes for the best communications upon the follow- 
ing subjects :—“ The origin and mode of occurrence of gold- 
bearing veins and of associated minerals;” “ The influence of 
the Australian climate in producing modifications of diseases ;” 
“The infusoria peculiar to Australia ;” and “ Water supply in 
the interior of New South Wales.” No essay was received on 
the second subject, and in connection with the first and third 
subjects no awards were made. The Society’s medal and a prize 
of £25 had been awarded to Mr. W. E. Abbott, of Wyngen, for 
his paper on the water supply in the interior of New South 
Wales. 
(A full report of Mr Abbott’s paper appeared in the Sydney 
Morning Herald of 4th December.) 
Sydney, 17th December, 1884.—Mr. H.C. Russell, president, 
in the chair. 
This was a special meeting called to hear an account from 
Mr. Caldwell of his recent scientific discoveries. Mr. Caldwell 
stated that when he came out, two years ago, he found very 
great difficulty in getting specimens of the platypus or echidna. 
Whilst everyone told him it was to be obtained in this river, or 
that, he generally found that the skin hunter had been before 
him and had got only two or three specimens. The first few 
months of the present year he spent in obtaining marsupials, 
such as kangaroos, possums, and native bears. Marsupials were 
considered in the colonies to be universal property, and every- 
one considered himself qualified to tell him how the kangaroos 
produced their young. Asa matter of fact, the scientific world 
knew already that the kangaroo produced its young in the same 
way as the rest of the milk-giving animals. That had been 
proved by Professor Owen nearly 50 years ago, whilst the early 
stages of that development which formed the basis of the modern 
embryological work upon the subject had not been found. No one 
expected to find the kangaroo growing ontheteat; butnevertheless 
no one had found the stages from impregnation up to birth of 
the young, owing to the insufficient quantity available to enable 
the embryology of these animals to be determined. This infor- 
mation, however, he had obtained in the last months of 1883, 
and the first few of the present year. He had made a number 
of expeditions all over New South Wales in search of marsupials, — 
and in April of this year he went to the Burnett River, in 
Queensland, where the ceratodus is found, both there and on 
the Mary River, and these two only. He had remained there 
since that time, and whilst he obtained there the ceratodus, he 
also got in the same district the early stages of the ornithorhyn- 
chus and the echidna or bush porcupine. He then said a few 
words about his camp. He found it was useless to live on the 
stations or far away from the river if he hoped to observe the 
ceratodi. It was four months before he found any trace of their 
