President's Address. 
15 
are well worthy of our earnest study, whether we regard them 
as means of exercising our mental powers, or as leading us to 
higher views of Him who has created all things, and for whose 
pleasure they are and were created. 
The followers of science have sometimes been blamed for 
attempting to subvert religion by their speculations. There 
can be no doubt that in former times, and even at the present 
day, some have started theories which have a tendency to 
shake the faith of weak naturalists. But these are opposi- 
tions of science falsely so called, — vague theories not founded 
on facts. There is no fear of true science in its bearings 
on. religion. It is only want of science which produces any 
jarrings. The more we investigate the wonders of creation, 
the more we shall see the harmony which subsists between the 
Word and the works of God. 
I. Contributions to the Natural History of tlie Hudson's Bay Company* s 
Territories. Part II. — Mammalia (continued.) By Andrew Mur- 
ray, F.R.S.E., President of tlie Botanical Society of Edinburgh. 
Rein-Deer (Rangifer Caribou). — In my last communica- 
tion on this subject, I drew attention to the antlers of the 
American rein-deer, — their peculiar form, their mode of 
growth, and the habits of the animal, — as bearing on the 
question of its identity with the Lapland rein- deer, and made 
some suggestions and speculations, with the hope that they 
might lead some of my correspondents to inquire more par- 
ticularly into these points, and give us reliable information 
upon them, which might enable us to come to a correct con- 
clusion on the subject. I am happy to say, that these ob- 
servations have had the desired elFect, and that, with an 
additional supply of horns and heads, I have this year re- 
ceived divers remarks on the points I indicated for inquiry. 
One intelligent correspondent, Mr J. Mackenzie of Moose 
Factory (from whose communications I have received much 
satisfaction), goes at some length into the subject, and his 
information, as to the time of the year when the horns are 
cast at the different periods of the animal's life, clears up the 
discrepancies which have been noticed in the statements of dif- 
ferent authors on this subject. It will be seen that the casting 
