ANNUAL MEETING. 
135 
The Worst Vandals. 
Mrs. Brightwen has alluded to the fact that many children show their love for 
birds by throwing stones at them and their love of flowers by gathering and then 
throwing them away. It is a sad sight on any bank holiday to see the remains of 
flowers carelessly gathered and then thrown away. But there is something even 
worse than gathering flowers, and that is grubbing up the roots. Our most beau- 
tiful flowers, even the common ones, are being diminished by grubbing up the 
roots and carrying them away. That is very sad ; and certainly this Society will 
be doing a very good work if it can succeed in educating the children and in 
stopping those who eradicate the rare and beautiful species ; for it is against them 
we must be on our guard. There is no reason in the nature of things why the 
mere growth of population should lead to the destruction of our birds and flowers. 
If we could only instil into the minds of children, both young and grown up, 
the principles to which Mrs. Brightwen has eloquently alluded, we might hope to 
arrest the gradual destruction of the rarer birds and the loveliest flowers, and 
enjoy all the pleasure which might be derived from the richness and variety of the 
fauna and flora of our country. 
Sir W. H. Flower congratulated the Society upon the success of that 
meeting. He had passed earlier in the day by that protected nook between the 
Serpentine and Rotten Row, where so many birds and animals have found a 
pleasant resting place. Such a spot was something to be thankful for ; but the 
many passed it by unnoticed. He congratulated the Society on their choice of a 
president. There was no man in the country who did so much in so many 
different ways as .Sir John Lubbock. He was rather afraid of some of the Acts 
brought into the House of Commons in regard to some of the Society’s particular 
subjects. It was better to trust to the efforts of the Selborne and kindred bodies to 
disseminate a knowledge and love of nature, and so to create a sentiment in 
favour of the protection and preservation of all that should be protected and pre- 
served, than to create new crimes out of the actions of those who violated the 
principles of the Selborne Society. At any rate where that was to be done it 
should be done with the greatest possible care, lest harm should follow rather than 
good. Profe.ssor Flower concluded by moving that the thanks of the meeting be 
accorded to their President, who had so often before shown his unique capacities 
in the popularisation of science. 
Dr. Dudley Buxton, in seconding the vote of thanks, dwelt upon the peculiar 
fitness for the office of President of the .Selborne Society which .Sir John Lubbock’s 
valuable researches in the domain of Natural History gave him. The work of 
the Society was necessarily progressive, and must be largely of the nature of a 
propaganda, and with such a President it was reasonable to expect greater success 
in the future, and more keen forward movement. The success of that night’s 
meeting was an emphatic justification of an innovation first made last year, when 
the Annual General Meeting of the Society was changed from a mere formal 
gathering together of a few officers in a dark room in a street off the Strand to a 
cheerful and brilliant conversazione held in Suffolk Street. Then came the 
removal of the Society to its present premises, an earnest of more vitality, 
more forward movement in the future. Enjoyable as were such large meetings 
they had yet a further use. At such times the Branches could meet and arrange 
mutual plans for work. In all this renewed vigour they needed a head, and 
probably no one in that room would doubt that no better head could have been 
found than Sir John Lubbock, who in honouring the Society, honoured himself 
in forwarding so good a work. Before he sat down, he would like to say a 
word about the remark Mr. Wakefield had made, that the Selborne village was 
to have a pure supply of water in the far future ; as a matter of fact, he was glad 
to say that far future was a very near future, as the works were complete, and 
would on June ist be supplying Gilbert White’s village with pure water. 
