830 
Report to the General Meeting, 
24. The Department of Research and Comparative Pathology, 
w hich has been established at the Royal Veterinary College under a 
grant from the Society, is now in working order. In the Labo- 
ratory, during the past three months, the undernoted subjects have 
received attention, and most of them are yet under investigation, 
viz. :— Milk from tuberculous cows ; tumours ; suspected actino- 
mycosis ; cystic tumours ; tuberculosis in the horse ; tuberculosis 
in cattle ; pysemic abscesses in cow's liver ; pleuro-pneumonia, 
contagious and septic ; anthrax in cows ; foot-rot in sheep ; and a 
form of tuberculosis in the kangaroo. 
25. The Council have appointed as Provincial Veterinary 
Surgeons of the Society, Mr. Owen Thomas, of Ty-coch, Llanerchy- 
medd, for the county of Anglesey ; and Mr. C. Hedworth Golledge, 
of Sherborne, for the county of Dorset. 
26. In the six months ending November 30, over 700 samples 
have been sent by Members for analysis at the Society's Laboratory. 
Of these over 200 consisted of samples of linseed-cake. The number 
of cases in which linseed-cake, purchased without a guarantee of 
purity, has been found to be extremely impure or adulterated fully 
confirms the repeated cautions of the Chemical Committee on this 
subject, and shows the necessity of Members of the Society acting on 
the advice embodied in the form of "Contract Note " issued by the 
Council in the early part of the year. The number of samples of 
decorticated cotton-cake sent for analysis shows a very considerable 
diminution. This is without doubt due to the very inferior quality 
and excessive hardness of the great bulk of the cake imported into 
this country. The number of manures sent for analysis again shows 
a considerable falling- off. Manures sold with a distinct guarantee 
have, as a general rule, proved of good quality. Some cases, how- 
ever, of adulterated bones and inferior dissolved bones have been 
dealt with in the Quarterly Reports of the Chemical Committee. A 
few instances of superphosphate containing low percentages of soluble 
phosphate have also occurred. A very large number of samples of 
drinking-water have been examined, and in many instances reported 
upon as unfit for use. 
27. In addition to the analyses of samples sent by Members of 
the Society, eight analyses of manures and feeding-stuffs have been 
made in connection with the Woburn Experimental Farm ; and 
over 800 determinations of nitrogen in samples of soil from the 
permanent wheat and barley plots have been made. The crops of 
wheat and barley from the permanent and rotation plots of the 
Experimental Farm have been threshed and weighed, and the 
results will be published in the Journal. On the rotation plots 
the whole of the crop of swedes was unfortunately destroyed by 
" finger-and-toe." Feeding experiments on one hundred sheep and 
eighteen bullocks have just been started. 
28. Three hundred and eighty applications have been made to 
the Consulting Botanist during the year, principally referring to 
