REPORT OF THE COUNCIL 
OF THE 
YORKSHIRE PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, 
February, 1909. 
j"N presenting the Annual Report for the year 1908, the 
Council feels that it has every reason to congratulate the 
Members upon another successful year’s work. 
In addition to the usual Spring and Winter Lectures, a 
list of which will be found at page 8 of the Report, a new 
departure was made last March and April by the introduction 
of three Natural History Lectures to children. These were 
given by Miss Simpson, of Leeds University, on “Pond Life,” 
and were illustrated both by lantern slides and specimens. 
The lectures proved a great success, the Theatre of the 
Museum was crowded with young people who followed the 
life history of the frog with the keenest interest, and it is 
hoped that a similar series of Children’s Lectures may be 
repeated in the near future. 
In April, the York Field Naturalists’ Society, which had 
held its meetings and kept its books and specimens in our 
Museum, was dissolved and re-formed as a Section of the 
Philosophical Society, very much on the same lines as the 
Photographic Section. It was felt that the multiplication of 
Societies with kindred objects was a mistake, and that greater 
usefulness could be achieved by amalgamation. 
At the request of your Council, Messrs. Platnauer and 
Benson have prepared and presented a Report upon the con¬ 
dition of the monuments in the lower room of the Hospitium 
and the ruins of St. Mary’s Abbey and St. Leonard’s Hospital. 
They found that, beyond washing, the monuments in the 
Hospitium required little further attention, but that the ruins 
