PROCEEDINGS

OF THE

LIVERPOOL

LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY.

ANNUAL MEETING.-SIXTY-EIGHTH SESSION.

ROYAL INSTITUTION, October 7th, 1878.

JOHN J. DRYSDALE, M.D., M.R.C.S., PRESIDENT, in the Chair.

THE Minutes of the last Meeting of the preceding Session were read and confirmed, after which the following Report was read by the Honorary Secretary:

REPORT.

The unabated interest which continues to mark the Proceedings of the Literary and Philosophical Society renders the presentation of an Annual Report an easy and agreeable task; and the Council feels that in addressing the Members at the commencement of the sixty-eighth Session, it is justified in congratulating them upon the success which crowns their efforts to maintain the Society in its efficiency and reputation. The numerously-attended meetings, the keen discussions of the principal scientific questions of the day, and the character of the papers read,

all bear witness to the Society's intellectual activity, and to the earnestness of its Members in the cultivation of literature and philosophy.

This was particularly shown during the last Session by the promptness with which the Members adopted the recommendation of the Council, that the kindred Societies of Liverpool should be invited to join the Literary and Philosophical Society in holding a Soirée, wherein the Associated Societies should exhibit objects, specimens, and scientific appliances illustrative of their respective departments of study, and further indicate the character and quality of their work by lectures and experiments. The remarkable success which attended this first Associated Soirée of the Literary, Scientific, and Art Societies of Liverpool induces your Council to recommend a renewal of the Society's invitation for an early meeting of delegates, to consider the desirability of holding a second Soirée.

Your Council has the gratification of reporting that the strength of the Society is now greater than at any former period, the number of Ordinary Members on its roll being two hundred and forty-six. Two names have been removed by death since the last Session, those of Mr. James Aikin, who had been a member for forty-five years, and of Mr. Christopher Bell, who had been connected with the Society for twenty-three years. Seventeen Members have resigned, and twenty-nine new Members have been admitted.

The names of two Honorary Members who have done some service for the Society will be missed from the roll, viz., the Rev. Dr. Booth, F.R.S., and Professor Henry.

Dr. Booth had been connected with the Society since 1844, in which year he was elected an Ordinary Member, being at that time Vice-Principal of the Collegiate Institution in Shaw Street. Two years afterwards he was elected to the Presidential Office, and on his removal from Liverpool

was made an Honorary (then termed Corresponding) Member in 1853. Besides papers and addresses, Dr. Booth contributed donations to the Society's library, and only just before his death, in April last, he forwarded to the Hon. Librarian a copy of his work on some New Geometrical Methods, in two volumes, for presentation to the Society.

Professor Henry, LL.D., of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, had likewise earned the distinction conferred upon him by the Society in 1870, by frequent donations to the library of the valuable and varied publications issued by the Institute of which he was the first Secretary and Director. To none of its correspondents is the Literary and Philosophical Society more indebted for donations than to the kindred Societies and Institutions of North America : prominent among these is the Smithsonian Institution, and the Council feels assured that the Members of this Society will mourn the loss of their Honorary Member, in sympathy with the regents of that Institution, which, by the devotion of a lifetime, Professor Henry made what its founder intended it to be, an efficient instrument for the "increase and diffusion of knowledge amongst men."

With the exception of these two names, the lists of Honorary and Corresponding Members, and of the Associates, remain unaltered; but it will be necessary to consider the re-election of the following gentlemen, whose terms as Corresponding Members are expired: The Rev. J. Holding, M.A., F.R.G.S., London; Mr. George Hawkins, Colombo, Ceylon; and Mr. J. Lewis Ingram, Bathurst, River Gambia.

The volume of Proceedings for the last Session has now passed through the press, and it is hoped that copies will be ready for distribution before the end of the present month.

A representation having been made to the Council that a portion of the duties assigned by the Laws to the Secretary