5
stock of human knowledge. In Epping Forest and the County
of Essex we have a fine area to work in, and I am happy to
say that we already include in our ranks many members well
versed in special branches of natural history (using this term
in its widest sense) to whom we shall look for assistance in
their respective subjects; and I am also glad to be able to
announce that many eminent specialists outside our own
Society have promised their valuable aid in identifying speci-
mens or in other ways promoting the objects of the Club.
Our chief object, the advancement of natural science, will be
best effected by the publication of original papers, notes, and
discussions. But we must likewise bear in mind that science
will be also indirectly promoted by mutual intercourse and
instruction, and, above all, by fostering and educating the
scientific faculty in our younger members. Who knows but
that in the County of Essex there may be another John Ray
or some future Darwin waiting only for encouragement and
the spirit of emulation to develop faculties which will subse-
quently establish him in a high position in the world of
science. The discovery of such an individual would surely be
of far greater importance to science than the discovery of a
species new to the British fauna or flora. It is our duty to
go forth into the highways and byeways and bring such mem-
bers into our fold. The sociable gatherings of a Field Club
are far more calculated to inspire the young scientific aspirant
with confidence in his own powers than the more formal
meetings of a learned Society, where stern discussion is neces-
sary, and where valuable metal must be separated from
useless dross by a process of rigid criticism. Nor can our
older members, whether naturalists or not, fail to derive
benefit from association with those who have studied for
themselves some page in the great book of nature. In these
days when science is progressing with such gigantic strides
that no one man can keep pace with its development in all
branches—when specialism has become an absolute necessity
for individual advancement, and when results of value can
only be obtained by rigidly limiting oneself to some restricted
subject, and ignoring, for the time, the rest of nature—there
is much to be learnt by interchanging ideas with those who