We Bid You A Hearty Welcome, And In So Honouring Ourselves We Only Ask You To Consider Yourselves At Home, Remembering That You Are Still On British Soil.

In conclusion Mr. President and Gentlemen, we sincerely hope that your stay in this portion of Her Majesty's Empire may be as happy and as fruitful to the Association as it is grateful for so many reasons to the people of Montreal and of the Dominion.

J L BEAUDRY,

Mayor

CHAS GLACKMEYER,

City Clerk

Sir WM THOMSON acknowledged in cordial terms the hearty welcome expressed in this address. The Association, he continued, when it commenced the experiment of being a peripatetic Association for the advancement of science, made an experiment which many considered of a doubtful character. It was urged that although zeal for a new thing might carry the Association on for a few years successfully, the success would cease with the novelty. This prophecy had not been fulfilled. On the contrary, the experiment had been crowned with brilliant success. He did not think the founders of the Association, fifty-two years ago, when they drew up the wise plan and regulations of the society which have since continued in force almost without change, imagined, for a moment, the possibility of a meeting being held on this side of the Atlantic. (Applause) Their meeting here was strictly within the letter of the law and wholly in accordance with the spirit by which the British Association was directed, and that was to carry through the British Empire any advancement in science that could be promoted by the existence of the Association.

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