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MARQUIS OF RIPON : ADDRESS. 
plating to turn their attention this year to that important district, 
and he ventured to say that they would find much to interest them 
among the fells and dales of the north-western part of this county, 
or in the iron district of Cleveland. "Whichever place in the North 
Eliding they proposed to visit, he could say that Teesdale, Swale- 
dale, and Wensleydale were all of them well worth exploring They 
would all prove highly interesting to men of science, and sure he 
was that they would afford to every member of this society, and to 
all the friends who might accompany them, very many most pict- 
uresque and attractive scenes for those who were lovers of nature. 
(Applause.) There was another reason which made him, who was 
a good deal connected with the North Riding, having the honour 
to be Lord-Lieutenant of the Riding — glad to find that the society 
contemplated visiting part of the county this year, and that was 
because they would thereby, as he trusted, give an impulse to 
the study of science there. It must be borne in mind that the 
visits of this society to different parts of the county, were not 
merely intended to benefit the members of the society themselves, 
but the meetings and excursions being open to others, they were 
intended to propogate an interest in science and to encourage its 
study in the districts which they might visit. (Hear, hear.) He 
might be permitted for a few moments to ask them to consider 
what were the functions of a society of this kind, and what was 
the position which it held in the general educational system of the 
country. When he talked about the position which this society 
held in the educational system of the country, he might be met 
with the preliminary objection — " What do you mean by talking 
about the educational system of this country? We have not got 
anything in the nature of an educational system at all. It is all 
left to haphazard, and to individual zeal and local effort, and there 
is nothing systematic about it." He supposed that that ciiticism. 
which was not meiely an imagination of his, but which we saw 
made of our educational system from time to time, arose from those 
who desired to see established in this country a wide-spread general 
system of State education— primary, secondary and tertiary — set 
