2 
Proceedings of Eoyal Society of Edinburgh. [sess. 
Professor Sir DOUGLAS MACLAGAN, Vice-President, 
in the Chair. 
Chairman’s Opening Address. 
(Read December 3, 1888.) 
It is a time-honoured custom in this as in other learned societies, 
that the annual Session shall he inaugurated and its last meeting 
closed hy an address from the Chair, and it is my duty now to say 
a few words to you on the occasion of the opening of our 106th 
Session. 
I would have shrunk from undertaking this duty, but for the 
reason that our indefatigable Secretary, Professor Tait, has ex- 
piscated the fact that I am the only one of the Society’s Vice- 
Presidents who has never given any address from the Chair, and 
thus the Council of the Society was led to insert in their minutes 
a request — almost equivalent to a command — that I should say 
something to you on the present occasion. I comply with this, not 
from any feeling that I am qualified to do so, but on the principle 
that those who accept the honours of the Society have no right to 
do so without attempting, however imperfectly, to discharge the 
relative duties. 
I can at all events congratulate you on the prosperous condition 
of the Society as regards the number of Fellows. The roll of the 
Society at present contains 494 Ordinary Fellows, 32 Foreign 
Honorary Fellows, and 19 British Honorary Fellows. In reference 
to our Ordinary Fellowship, I cannot refrain from adverting to 
an opinion which I have heard expressed in reference to their 
number, that there must be too great facilities for admission to their 
ranks. I demur to this opinion. It is not necessary that we 
should maintain that all our Fellows are special cultivators of 
science ; but, setting aside for a moment the department of litera- 
ture, I am persuaded that all who are admitted here have shown 
before they have passed the somewhat prolonged ordeal of the 
Council, and have been put before the Society for ballot, have 
taken a real interest, by study or otherwise, in the progress of 
science, and are desirous, so far as lies in their power, to promote 
its advancement. 
