X PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



The experiment of opening the gardens on Sundays, which 

 was commenced in 1888 for the sole purpose of giving such 

 Fellows as are fully occupied during the week an opportunity of 

 visiting them for scientific or practical purposes, has again, as 

 it did the year before, proved unsuccessful in that particular 

 direction ; it has therefore been decided to abandon it, as it 

 not only throws additional work on the officials on their one 

 rest day in the week, but also entails considerable expense on 

 the Society which can ill be spared from the general work of the 

 Gardens. 



The Society's Journal has been continued so as to enable 

 Fellows at a distance to enter more fully into and reap the 

 benefits of the study and work of those more actively engaged at 

 the centre. Three parts, forming Vol. XII., 707 pages, with 42 

 Plates of new plants, &c, have been published during the twelve 

 months, and letters are constantly received from the most 

 distant and diverse sources, testifying to the Fellows' appreciation 

 of this renewed branch of the Society's work. 



The Council wish to repeat verbatim one paragraph of their 

 last year's report, which runs as follows : 



11 All these Conferences and Meetings, and especially the 

 work and maintenance of the Chiswick Gardens and the publi- 

 cation of the Journal, have involved the Society in a very large 

 outlay, and the Council take this opportunity of endeavouring to 

 impress upon Fellows the absolute necessity there is for them 

 all individually (as many as have the Society's welfare at heart) 

 to endeavour to secure new Fellows to the Society if its work is 

 not only to be continued at its present standard, but still more 

 so if the ever-opening and extending opportunities of usefulness 

 are to be embraced and accepted. The adoption of £1. Is. as 

 one rate of subscription was, no doubt, a popular movement, but 

 the Council desire to remind the Fellows that such a low rate 

 of Fellowship can only be self-supporting if it draws into the 

 Society a very large number (far larger than at present exists) 

 of additional Fellows. The Council, therefore, venture to express 

 the hope that every Fellow of the Society will make an endeavour 

 to obtain at least one new Fellow during this present year. A 

 statement of the privileges of Fellows and of the aims and 

 objects of the Society, together with a form of nomination to 

 Fellowship, is for this purpose enclosed with this Eeport." 



