7 
At the meeting held on the 8th January in the present year 
two communications were read, one from Dr. Day, one of your 
Vice-Presidents, on the methods used by Mr. Bunt in investigating 
and predicting the Tides of the Port of Bristol, and the other by 
Dr. William Bird Herapath, on the presence of Arsenic and Thallium 
in the ores and medicinal preparations of Bismuth. 
On February the 5th, Mr. Charles Bortill Dunn read a paper 
on the ISTature, Cultivation, and Use of the Cotton Plant, and Mr. 
Hugh Owen one, in which he showed, that great departure from 
established types is not always a sufficient reason for generic or 
specific distinction amongst the Mollusca, which was illustrated by 
recent and fossil specimens. 
On March the 5th, Mr. William Sanders gave an account of 
the discovery of the remains of Holoptychius in the Old Eed 
Sandstone of Portishead, and Mr. W. W. Stoddart bi ought forward 
his extensive collection of recent and fossil Otoliths, obtained by 
dissection and by examination of Tertiary Strata containing fish 
remains, with a view to establish by comparison and analogy the 
relations of auditory structure in the lower animals. 
At the meeting of April the 2nd, which terminated the 
scientific proceedings of the first year of our Society, Dr. Alfred 
Day completed his elaborate and able commentary on Mr. Bunt's 
method of calculating and predicting the Tides of the Port of 
Bristol. A detailed description of the means employed by Mr. 
Bunt, and illustration by tables, added to the valae of this paper. 
At the various meetings animated discussions have been 
sustained, showing, that there exists amongst us a considerable 
amount of careful observation and study of natural phenomena, 
which may be fairly expected to bring forth a future harvest of 
good fruit. And your council entertains a strong conviction, that 
the operation of such a Society as this must, in the course of a 
short time, be widely felt, and will be the means of reviving that 
personal interest in the investigation and discovery of scientific 
facts, which too often declines for want of adequate stimulus to 
