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Proceedings of the Royal Society 
are, and it is no small proof of this when we find, as I have already 
stated, that our Transactions are almost every year becoming more 
bulky. 
The only practical suggestion which it occurs to me to offer 
under this head is, that means should be taken to ensure early 
publication. I am sorry to find that the volume containing last 
year’s papers has not yet been published, though the Society’s law 
expressly states that “ the Transactions shall be published at the 
close of each Session.” 
(2.) Another part of our proceedings to which I respectfully 
invite attention is the best mode of conducting our evening 
meetings. What is the object and use of these meetings ? From 
a paper published in the first volume of our Transactions, entitled, 
“ History of the Society ,” drawn up, I believe, by the first secre- 
tary, Dr Robison, it is stated that these meetings were held in 
order that — 
“ Essays and observations of members or their correspondents may be read 
publicly, and become the subjects of conversation. The author is likewise to 
furnish an abstract of his dissertation, to be read at the next meeting, when 
the conversation is renewed with increased advantage. 
“ Several papers have been communicated with the sole . view of furnishing 
an occasional entertainment to members, which do not afterwards appear in 
the Transactions. Essays and cases are often read at the meetings in order 
to obtain the opinions of members on interesting or intricate subjects. Some 
papers intended for future publication have been withdrawn for the present 
by their authors, in order to profit by what has occurred in the conversations 
which the reading of the papers has suggested.” 
The original intention, therefore, of our evening meetings was 
to encourage discussion among the members on the papers read, 
and this object we have ever since kept in view, though on account 
of the length and number of the papers put down to be read in one 
evening, there has often been no time for any discussion of them. 
I suppose it had been with the view of remedying this incon- 
venience that in October 1836 the Council of the Society made a 
remit to the three secretaries-— 
“ To report as. to the possibility of economising time by some change in 
the present order of the business of the general meetings, and by inducing 
the authors of papers to give (when necessary) condensed abstracts of them, 
leaving the details for being printed when their publication in the Transac- 
tions may be determined on.” 
