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one could have devoted himself to its interests more heartily than he has 
done on all occasions. Unhappily he has recently met with a severe domestic 
affliction, and he has also suffered in his own health, and the consequence has 
been that he has not latterly been able to use the same energy in advancing 
the cause of the institution as he did at first ; and our deficiency in point of 
members has, no doubt, been greatly owing to that circumstance. To his 
exertions we have been indebted for the great success we have previously 
met with. I cannot do better than read you a letter he sent me, announcing 
that he would not be able to be present at our meeting to-day, and which 
will give you, more fully than any words of mine could do, his own views 
with regard to the society : — 
Bridge House, Hammersmith, W., 
23rd May, 1868. 
My dear Sir, — Unfortunately I am summoned to serve upon the Grand 
Jury at Clerkenwell on Monday next, our anniversary. I fear this may 
prevent my being present at the Meeting altogether, or at least in time for 
business. I need not say how much I regret this ; and, all the more, because 
I fear the members will expect some explanation, besides what is hinted at 
in the Council’s Report, as to the apparent stagnation in some of our 
operations during the past year ; and they may naturally expect this 
explanation to come from me. 
To none, however, more than to myself, can the disappointment have been 
greater at seeing that our numbers should have been barely kept up, instead 
of being largely increased. Our anticipations in this respect were sufficiently 
expressed in the circulars issued last summer, upon resolving to engage the 
regular services of a paid secretary. This the council considered had become 
both a necessary and prudent step, not only in order to secure greater 
regularity in the management of our office affairs than was possible when 
they were in the hands of the late clerk, Mr. C. H. H. Stewart, with merely 
such superintendence as Captain Fishbourne and myself could give, while 
ourselves very closely engaged in other avocations elsewhere ; but also in 
order to make the existence and work of the society better known, and thus 
to draw fresh supporters to the good cause, with something like the prompti- 
tude with which our first numbers were enrolled, and the foundation lists 
filled up with nearly 300 names. 
The state of my health last summer gave warning of the impossibility 
of my being able to continue all the secretariat duties, after our numbers 
had become so large and the editorial work alone had grown so heavy 
(unless, indeed, I had neglected all prior duties and my private affairs), and 
this rendered the appointment of a regular secretary a necessity. But still I 
had hoped to be able to give aid from time to time, especially in the 
endeavour to recruit our ranks, and in otherwise assisting our new secre- 
tary in his most important work. You know, however, how all such antici- 
pations were destroyed ; and that subsequent illness and other hindrances 
have unfortunately still more completely prevented me from rendering any 
but the least service to the Institute. Indeed, I have often felt that it was 
perhaps my duty to resign the honorary secretaryship altogether ; and I 
have only refrained from doing so because I knew no one to take it up. 
I beg, therefore, that you will be good enough to explain to the meeting 
how much I regret this state of things ; and that I can only be regarded at 
present as nominally holding my position. Also how much I feel that 
