4 



WEEDS. 



A. H. PAWSON, J. P., F.L.S., F.G.S. 



Being his Presidential Address to the Yorkshire Naturalists' 

 Union, delivered at Leeds, 17th December 1904. 



In doing me the great honour of choosing- me for your President 

 for this year you have departed from your ordinary practice of 

 placing- at your head a man of scientific renown, and have 

 contented yourselves with a simple lover and observer of Nature. 



I freely acknowledge that I do not feel myself equal to 

 occupy a position which has been filled by those whom I regard 

 as my masters — by men of untiring- investigation and of original 

 research. And yet in this Society of ours — in this Union of 

 Societies — it seems fitting (though not perhaps in my own 

 person) that another phase of Natural History study should be 

 represented. 



The workers — the searchers into causes — are the men at 

 whose feet we sit, whose sacrifices win them immortal names — 

 but how few are their numbers among- the crowd of Naturalists ! 

 From my own point of view I fancy sometimes that these great 

 men, conscious of their own toils, are apt to value too lig-htly 

 those Nature lovers who confine their pleasant labours to the 

 observation and enjoyment of this green Earth and its occu- 

 pants. Yet Nature, the garment of the living God (if I may be 

 allowed to transpose the translation), is, before everything, a 

 manifestation of surpassing beauty^ — of absolute perfection of 

 form and colour — -of inconceivable ingenuity of adaptation and 

 design — and this has certainly been given to us for our delight. 



When we consider how generally disregarded is this wonder- 

 ful revelation, how few people take any notice at all of birds, and 

 clouds, and trees, and waters, and rocks, and flowers, and shells, 

 counting them as common and matters of course, and turning 

 carelessly away from the priceless pleasure which their study 

 offers them, I think that naturalists of all types and of every 

 calibre, however fortified by science or profound in research, at 

 all times and at all costs, ought to endeavour to the utmost of 

 their powers to turn the attention of these heedless ones to the 

 treasures they are throwing away with both hands, and that 

 they ought to value and encourage the humblest and most 

 ignorant of those who follow Nature from the love of her. For, 

 from whom are the ranks of the workers to be recruited if 

 Nature has not a large following ? 



Naturalist, 



