L Appendix : — Proceedings of 



Moreover, as nothing definite has yet been done in regard 

 to the five issued Vols, of Reeve's Iconica Conchologica, men- 

 tioned at a late meeting of the Committee as for sale and in 

 good order, your Committee are of opinion that the subject 

 should be again referred to them for consideration: so as in 

 this as in other cases, a favourable opportunity of adding to 

 the Library books of acknowledged value should not be lost. 



Your Committee would further propose that the General 

 Rules and Regulations of the Society, and the Rules of the 

 Library, should, together with a Catalogue of the books and 

 various articles contained in the Library and Museum, be 

 printed in a concise form and separately from the Journal, 

 for the information of Members and others, and that the stores 

 of the Society may be made as available as possible, as well 

 as deficiencies seen and supplied. 



And here your Committee are led to observe, with refer- 

 ence to another Society in Colombo, that they are not in the 

 least conflicting Societies; they dhTer altogether in their 

 constitution, in their purposes, and in their mode of operation. 



The design of this Society is to institute and promote in- 

 quiries into the History, Religion, Literature, Arts and Social 

 Condition of the present and former inhabitants of this Island, 

 with its Geology and Mineralogy, its Climate and Meteorology* 

 its Botany and Zoology. The object of the Colombo Athenaeum 

 is wholly different; and they pursue their respective objects 

 in quite a different way. The Athenaeum is not limited as 

 to place, nor restrained as to its subjects ; and in its endea- 

 vours to unite in the Lectures given, the interest which may 

 arise from oral delivery, from the play of fancy, or the 

 resources of intellect, in illustration, and the more substantial 

 course of views, diagrams, and experiments, it seeks to convey 

 information with amusement, to take us up the hill of know- 

 ledge and to the heights of science, otherwise than by the 

 old way of a laborious and difficult ascent, and make learning 

 pleasant to the soul not merely when attained but in the very 

 process of acquiring it. 



