XXV111 PROCEEDINGS—PERTHSHIRE SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCE. 
Glovers’ Hall in George Street, which was kindly granted for the 
purpose. Under the circumstances it was impossible to carry out 
the programme initiated at the beginning, of establishing a Library 
and Museum. In the third year, therefore, a room was secured at the 
Kirkside, to be used as a store-room and library. In the fourth year, 
finding itself strong enough, the Society hired a meeting-room in St. 
Ann’s Lane, which it continued to occupy till we obtained possession 
of the present building. In Kirkside a commencement, though on 
a very small scale, was made to form a Library and Museum; but in 
reality not much was done till we moved to Tay Street in 1881. 
Turning back now to the programme for which the founders 
established the Society in 1867, let us see how it has been carried 
out. 
Of monthly meetings—held for “the reading of communications” 
—there have been 155, the present meeting being the 156th. When 
the Society was first established, it was purposed to have a meeting 
every month of the year, and in the third year no less than 13 meet¬ 
ings were held. Soon, however, it was found that this was too 
ambitious an aim, and the meetings dropped to 7, which has been 
the average since, though in the tenth year there were only 4. At 
the meetings 200 papers, in addition to shorter communications, 
have been read, while several courses of lectures have also been pro¬ 
moted. Of papers the greatest number in one year was 18, and the 
least 4, and the yearly average 9—the average during the past three 
years being, however, above 12, the sixth to the eighteenth years 
being below the average. 
Of excursions we have made 86—or rather that is the number of 
programmed excursions which have come off. In addition to these, 
many other excursions, which were not officially arranged, have taken 
place. So far as the minute-book shows, there were no excursions 
during three years, and the average has been higher for the later 
years than it was in the earlier. 
Including the original members, about 610 persons have been 
admitted to the membership of the Society, the greatest number 
elected in one year being 78, and the least 5. As the present num¬ 
ber of members is 309, there has been a loss, by death or other 
causes, of 301 members. As will have been gathered, however, from 
the Report read by the Secretary, the loss in the membership is not 
to be attributed to death or to removal from the locality, but rather, 
I fear, to a backsliding on the part of those who were once members. 
The Secretary is, I think it will be admitted, one of, if not the , 
most important officers of the Society. During our twenty-one years 
we have had six Secretaries, viz. :—in the first and second years, Mr. 
John Stewart, an original member, and now our valued Treasurer;, 
in the third year, Mr. James M‘Farlane, also an original member, 
but who, having left Perth many years ago, is not now a member; 
in the fourth and fifth years, Mr. A. T. Scott: in the sixth and 
seventh years, myself; for the long period of eleven years—/.<?., from 
the eighth to the eighteenth,—Mr. J. Young; and since then Mr. 
S. T. Ellison, who, I trust, will long occupy the post. Of the 
Treasurers, a scarcely less important position, and in some ways more 
