26 
Secretaries’ Report for the year 1899. 
The following Report was read by Mr. H. A. Sauze:-— 
Twenty-four meetings of the Society have been held during the 
last year, the normal number according to our rules, unbroken by a 
failure to hold one even in the height of the summer, when it often 
happens many of our usual attending members are away from town at 
the same time, and when the temptation is strongest, to forsake the 
customary indoors gathering in this place, either to go collecting or to 
finish work resulting from that collecting. We touched low watermark 
in the matter of numbers at our second meeting in August, there being 
four only present on that occasion. The question is often started 
whether it is worth while continuing the holding of meetings during 
the summer months, but if I were to give my opinion as a member, 
and not as an official, I should certainly say it is better for the Society 
to hold the meetings, so that members may know there is still a rallying 
point if they wish to avail themselves of it. Our average attendance 
for the last year stands at fifteen, including our visitors, which is a 
slight decrease on the previous year. Out of our list of 67 members 
at which number we now stand, why cannot we get more than 22%. to 
appear regularly here ? Is it because we require a few members with 
theories so startling, audacious or exasperating, that shall compel 
attention, and call up all the reserves of the wit of the Society to 
combat ? 
The chief events of our past year have been the struggle to print 
“ Transactions,” a successful summer outing, and the representations 
to the Epping Forest authorities as to the interference of the keepers 
with the doings of the mild and virtuous entomologist. The Society 
is to be congratulated on having had its “Transactions” for 1898 duly 
printed, a work which of course falls into the business of the preceding 
year, and although our volume has been published uncommonly late 
in the year, it must be remembered that at the commencement of 1899 
it appeared very doubtful if we could publish at all. Ry taking the 
charge off the income of the Society, and inviting the liberality of our 
staunchest members to form a separate Publication bund, this printing 
has been accomplished. 
That the summer outing was a success no one who was present 
will deny. A locality (Darenth Wood) was chosen easy of access, and 
not too long a distance from London. Our conductor, Mr. \\ . 1. Cox, 
had been collecting here from time to time, and knew this resort of 
the older London entomologists was not yet played out. He did 
everything in his power to make the outing as comfortable as possible 
by telling us our trains, and making the necessary preliminary 
arrangements for tea, and was rewarded by seeing fifteen persons 
attending, and the list of Macros captured was run up to 69. 
The correspondence with the Epping Forest Committee of the 
City of London Corporation was undertaken at the instance of our 
member, Mr. Garland, who had been interfered with by a keeper in 
the Forest while collecting, who spoke to our member as if his tapping 
at the trees for larv® could he interpreted as doing “ damage.” A 
reply in due course was received from the Town Clerk, announcing 
that the Committee had given instructions to the keepers not to inter¬ 
fere with entomologists in their collecting providing no actual damage 
was done to the trees, a reply which your Council looked upon as 
satisfactory. 
