395 



SPECIAL GENERAL MEETING.— Monday, July 6, 1863. 



The Veky Eev. Chaeles Geayes, T>. D., President, in the Chair. 



Eead the following extracts from the " Eeport upon the Eoyal Dublin 

 Society,, the Museum of Irish Industry, and the System of Scientific 

 Instruction in Ireland" (pp. 33, 34), which apply to the Eoyal Irish 

 Academy : — 



"Othee Geants m Aid of Scien-ce and Aet m Dublin. 



" The other Institutions at Dublin which receive grants in aid of 

 Science and Art, are — 



" The Eoyal Irish Academy, which combines the objects of the 

 London Eoyal and Antiquarian Societies, and has acquired a high repu- 

 tation for the learning and activity of its researches. The last annual 

 vote was £500. 



The Eoyal Hibernian Academy, which was formed on the model 

 of the Eoyal Academy of London, and receives an annual grant of £300. 

 It was inquired into by Mr. Macleod, in 1858, on behalf of the Depart- 

 ment of Science and Art, and the annual grant was then appropriated 

 entirely to the educational purposes of the institution. 



^' The JSFational Gallery for Paintings and Sculpture. This has been 

 recently erected under the authority of two Acts of Parliament, passed 

 in the years 1854 and 1855, and the arrangements for completing its 

 fitments and acquiring its contents are in active progress. An elaborate 

 constitution, partly official and partly popular, has been given to it by 

 the same A cts of Parliament. 



" The Zoological Society, which receives an annual grant of £500, 

 and raises a larger sum from private subscriptions, and from the receipts 

 at the door. _ This well-managed Society contributes in a high degree to 

 the instruction and amusement of the public. 



The annual grant to the Zoological Society is voted in the esti- 

 mate of the Eoyal Dublin Society ; but, besides acting as the channel 

 for its payment, that Society does not exercise any interference with 

 respect to it. Some advantage would be gained if all the Parliamentary 

 grants in aid of Science and Art at Dublin were, in like manner, in- 

 f . eluded in the estimate of the Eoyal Dublin Society, and were paid 

 through its medium, inasmuch as they would then be annually brought 

 under consideration in one point of view, and the Council of the Eoyal 

 Dublin Society would have an opportunity of making any representa- 

 tion which the circumstances of the time might render proper in refe- 

 rence to them. 



" Beyond this, we cannot advise that the Eoyal Dublin Society 

 should be vested with any control over the proceedings of the other 

 Societies. Freedom of action is indispensable for the success of insti- 

 tutions which depend upon voluntary unpaid agency ; and, even when 



