6 



The Cryptogamic Meeting of the Society was held on 

 Saturday, the 19th October, at Orpington and St. Paul's 

 Cray Common. Twelve members and friends were present, 

 and Dr. M. C. Cooke attended as expert. Sixty-five speci- 

 mens of fungi were collected, amongst them being several 

 new to the district ; a list of these fungi will be printed in 

 the Transactions. 



The Council regret that the attendance was so moderate 

 at all these excursions, and trust that members will, in the 

 future, support the President to a greater extent. 



The Accounts of the Society, for the Session 1901-1902, 

 have been duly audited, and are issued, as usual, with this 

 Report, but the Council wish to call the particular attention 

 of the members to the adverse balance of £13 0s. Id. shown 

 by them. This debit balance has arisen from the circum- 

 stance of the Biennial Soiree coinciding with an unusually 

 heavy printers' bill, occasioned by the excellence of the 

 Papers read at the Meetings, two of which are printed in 

 full, and it will no doubt be extinguished in the current year. 

 There is, however, but little chance of the Society's accumu- 

 lating any money this year towards the expenses of the next 

 Soiree in 1903, as has always been the policy of the Council. 



An expenditure of about £50 per annum — the amount of 

 last year's disbursements — is not excessive for such a Society 

 as the West Kent Natural History, Microscopical and 

 Photographic, and, in a neighbourhood like Blackheath, the 

 Council should certainly be able to rely upon an income 

 which would cover it : requiring, as it does, only a member- 

 ship of a hundred at the current subscription of half-a- 

 guinea. Unfortunately, during the last few years many 

 of the old supporters of the West Kent Society have fallen 

 off through death and other unavoidable causes ; so the 

 Council wish strongly to urge upon the subscribers the 

 necessity of inducing suitable new members to join, in order 

 to perpetuate the prosperity of this old Society, to which, in 

 former years, so many distinguished men have belonged. 



