PREFACE. 
The First Volume of the Tasmanian Journal is 
now laid before the Public, with the hope that the 
earliest efforts of the Society, the substance of whose 
Transactions is here recorded, have not been al¬ 
together unproductive of benefit to our fellow 
countrymen, and to this our adopted home. The 
publication of our Transactions is, perhaps, the 
most important field of action for our body : it 
stimulates to study, and assists research,—it shows 
how far we are from the fulfilment of all we wish 
and hope, and yet how much a very moderate 
degree of diligence avails to diminish the interval. 
Associated together as we are by the single bond 
of a common desire to diffuse in these countries 
the solid advantages of Science, we are thus enabled 
to record whatever of value may be elicited by the 
studies of any of our members, leaving to each 
the responsibility for all errors, and the credit for 
any merit of originality. Nor is the use of these 
