XY111 
PROCEEDINGS, 
a copy of the publication in which the papers for indexing 
appear; and the Delegate is expected to attend the Conferences, 
to report the proceedings to his Society, to send to the Secretary 
of the Corresponding Societies’ Committee a printed copy of his 
report, and to endeavour to get his Society to carry on scientific 
investigations in its own area, especially such as may help the 
British Association Committees of Besearch. 
It is to fulfil one of these obligations that, as the Society’s 
Delegate to the Bradford meeting, I now have to report such 
proceedings at last year’s Conference as may be of interest to our 
members or may indicate suitable fields of research. 
The meetings of the Conference were held on the 6th and 11th 
of September. The Corresponding Societies’ Committee of the 
Association was represented, amongst others, by two members of 
our Society, your Delegate at each meeting, and our past President, 
Mr. William "Whitaker, at the second. At the first meeting 
Professor Poulton presided, and at the second Mr. Whitaker. 
First Meeting. 
The first business was the consideration of the Beport of the 
Corresponding Societies’ Committee. Being the last year of the 
nineteenth century, the Beport opened with a review of the pro¬ 
ceedings of the Conferences since they were reconstituted in 1885. 
Prom the first Conference in 1880 to the fifth in 1884 the 
‘ Transactions ’ of our Society contain the only permanent record 
of the proceedings,* the first Conference officially recognised by 
the Council of the British Association being that held in 1885, 
from which time the proceedings have been recorded in the Beports 
of the Association. Suggestions as to improvements in the 
procedure at the Conferences were then discussed, and the names 
of four Societies added to the list were given, raising the number 
of Corresponding Societies to 75. 
The Beport gave rise to a long discussion on procedure, in which 
eighteen Delegates took part. In discussing subjects for debate 
it was mentioned that only one Society of the 75 responded to 
a request to suggest a subject for discussion at the present meeting, 
the subject suggested being Dew-ponds. It may he added that the 
Society nominally suggesting it was the Hertfordshire Natural 
History Society. The idea arose from a conversation which I had 
with Professor Miall at Leeds last Easter, when it was arranged 
that if I could get the subject accepted, he would open the 
discussion upon it. 
The result of the debate was to leave things as they were, it 
being tacitly admitted that the Corresponding Societies’ Committee 
made the best possible arrangements for the Conferences. 
The only other subject discussed at this meeting was the question 
of copyright, which will probably he legislated upon in the present 
session of Parliament. Scientific Societies have no copyright in 
their publications unless they pay their contributors, the copyright 
* ‘ Trans. Herts Nat. Hist. Soc.,’ Yol. VI, pp. 45-47. 
