3 
The natural history of Australia stands out unique from other 
parts of the world. The evolution which has produced so many 
changes in other lands appears in this Island Continent to have 
almost stood still or moved but slowly. This may be due to its 
separation from Asia before the Carnivora appeared there. In- 
deed, the extraordinarily slow development in Australia points to 
what an immensely important factor Carnivora must have been in 
the great struggle for existence and survival of the fittest in the 
great process of evolution. 
While the mammals of other lands are absent in Australia, the 
earliest forms of vertebrate mammals in the fossil beds of Europe 
are represented by the marsupial Kangaroo of to-day. Many of 
the Birds, Fishes, and Crustacea of Australia living at the present 
time have long ceased to exist in other parts of the world. In 
the Vegetable Kingdom, also, plants of the long past Carboniferous 
age are still represented in living form in Australia, whilst our 
aboriginal men do not appear to have evolved very far from their 
Stone-age ancestors. I have alluded to these conditions so as to 
indicate how wide and unique is our field of natural history, to 
raise our interest and enthusiasm, to advocate study and record, 
for it is one of the functions of our Society to stimulate and assist 
research in this wonderland of nature. 
SCIENCE AND CIVILISATION 
I feel that at the termination of the Great War it will be 
opportune to bring before you, for your consideration, a few 
points in connection with science and its relation to progress and 
civilisation. 
In referring to the events of last year it is impossible to think 
of any work or progress which has not been connected with or 
affected by the Great War. Each of my predecessors took for his 
Presidential address some of the educational or industrial problems 
which could he expected to arise after such a struggle, and now that 
the war is practically over, the problems of Peace are found to be 
more serious and more complex tlian those of the War. 
The termination of the V ar has come perhaps more completely 
and more suddenly than was anticipated. It could hardly have been 
expected that the German Navy would surrender without a fight, 
and be interned in a British harbour, and that the Allies would so 
soon be in occupation of the cities of the Kliine. 
As the War involved a greater number and variety of nations 
than any previous war, so the problems of Peace must affect every 
country of the world, for the spread of international commerce, 
with the rapid means of communication by railway, steamer, post 
and telegraphs, make any treaty or agreement between nations a 
matter of world -wide consequence. 
