PROCEEDINGS—PERTHSHIRE SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCE. Cxli 
difficulty in clearing off, by a special effort, whatever deficiency there 
may be at the time when the Museum is taken over by the public 
authorities. It has been considered by the Treasurer and Council 
that it will be better not to make the special effort until that time 
arrives. This question of handing over the Museum to the town is 
one to which I have referred so often, and which I have explained 
so fully, that I am unwilling to take up more of your time with it on 
the present occasion. There is just one point, however, on which 
some misconception seems to remain, and which I should like to 
make clear. It has been said that we, who are interested in Natural 
Science, have got up the Museum for our own benefit, and that 
therefore we ought to maintain it at our own cost. If the first part 
of this proposition were true, then the corollary which follows 
would be correct also. The truth, however, is exactly the reverse. 
A naturalist does not require to spend thousands of pounds in 
getting up elaborately-mounted specimens and arranging them in 
cases of polished mahogany and plate-glass merely for the purpose 
of his own study. A few cardboard boxes to contain unmounted 
skins, etc., would serve his purpose as well. When the ornithologist 
or the entomologist goes to the British Museum in London to 
pursue the study of the special group in which he is interested, he 
does not spend his time admiring the show-cases in the public 
galleries. Armed with a special permit, he makes his way along the 
uninviting vaulted passages in the basement till he comes to a little 
room where boxes and cabinets are ranged in apparent confusion, 
with no attempt at attractiveness, but containing untold treasures 
for the eye of the specialist. The same holds good in our own case 
on a much reduced scale. The object which we have kept steadily 
in view during all the years of labour expended on the Museum has 
been, not our own gratification, but the enlightenment and elevation 
of the community, and it is on this ground that we now claim the 
support of the community in carrying on the work which we have 
initiated and equipped single-handed. 
The subject which I have chosen for my address this evening, 
and which I shall be compelled to treat in the very briefest possible 
manner, is 
THE ORIGIN OF SOILS, 
WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE SOILS OF PERTHSHIRE. 
As our Society has for its field of research the natural history of 
one of the most important agricultural counties in Scotland, it is 
surely only fitting that we should turn some of our attention to 
those aspects of natural science which have a special bearing on the 
operations of the agriculturist. It is to be feared that this is a duty 
which we have too much neglected in the past; but, if that is the 
case, I am glad to say that in certain directions we have now begun 
to make amends. Our Curator, with the assistance of one or two 
specialists, such as Dr. Wm. A. Smith and Mr. R. Stewart M‘Dougall, 
of Edinburgh, has begun to work up collections of plants and 
animals representing the lifeffiistories of the friends and foes of the 
