15 



from which T have quoted, office-bearers were 

 appointed, and the Club was launched. 



The office-bearers appointed were: — 



Secretaries — Ralph Tate and W. T. Chew. 



Treasurer — A. F. Herdman (Alexander F. Herd- 

 man was a member of the well-known flax-spinning: 

 family who established a flourishing manufacturing- 

 business at Sion Mills, near Strabane. He died towards 

 the middle of the Club's first year). 



Committee — John Grainger, M.A. ; S. A. Stewart, 

 William M'Millan, John W. Forrester, Robert Work- 

 man, William Campbell, William H. Patterson, John S. 

 Holden, John W. Browne, Thomas Workman, Hugh 

 Robinson, and Samuel Symington. 



The Committee met' on 13th March and' elected 

 John Grainger as Chairman. Afterwards well-known 

 as the Rev. Canon Grainger, D.D., of Broughshane, 

 he was at this time about to enter on his lifework in 

 the Church. He had been educated at Belfast 

 Academy, then situated at the corner of Academy 

 Street and Donegall Street, of which the Rev. Dr. R. 

 J. Bryce was Headmaster. Dr. Bryce's brother, James, 

 taught Mathematics and Science, _ and on . Saturday 

 half-holidays he gave his pupils practical instruction in 

 geology and other branches of natural history by 

 excursions to the Cave Hill and other suitable places; 

 in fact, James Bryce was a pioneer in the introduction 

 of Natural History as a branch of school education. 

 Later on, the Grainger family moved to Holywood, and 

 here John Grainger came into intimate fellowship with 

 Robert Patterson's two sons, William and Robert, both 

 of them keen Naturalists. He entered T.C.D. in 1849, 

 graduated in 1854, and finished his divinity course in 

 1855. For some years afterwaids he was occupied in 

 the business of his father, who was a shipowner, and it 

 was not until the 21st December, 1863, that his ordina- 

 tion took place. He remained in Belfast for a couple of 

 months, completing his term in the Chairmanship of 

 the Club, and then left for a curacy in Dublin. 

 Grainger never wrote much on the scientific subjects 

 which interested him. He was more than anything else 

 a collector, and his accumulation of some 60,000 

 natural history and archaeological specimens found a 

 home before his death in the Belfast Municipal 

 Museum in Royal Avenue. We all remember "The 



