The Daily Telegraph TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1884.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3914, 5 February 1884, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1884.

The annual general meeting of the Hawke's Bay Philosophical Institute took place'yesterday afternoon, and was largely attended. The meeting was remarkable from it being the last at which Mr W. Colonso will be present as the chief executive officor of the society. His retirement cannot but mark an epoch-in the history of'the Institute. Owing its origin mainly to his exertions, built up and sustained by the deep, interest that he has taken in the scientific objects of tho society, and by his unwearied servicos, his resignation of the secretaryship, it must bo feared, will be a serious blow to its further advancement. For tho last ten years ho has been the life and soul of the Institute, and but for him it is very doubtful whether tho Hawko's Bay branch would ovor havo contributed its quota of scientific investigation to the New Zealand .Institute. The difficulty of finding a worthy successor to Mr Colenso was fully realised fit the meeting, and repeated efforts were made to induce him to withdraw his resignation. Ho appeared, ..however, to have made up his mind to retire, and eventually Mr A, Hamilton, of Petane, was elected in his stead. The reasons advanced by Mr Colenso for his resignation did not strike his hearers as being very' cogent, but there may have been other causes for such a step that he did not choose to make public. His chief reason was that, engaged as he was in literary pursuits in the cause of science, ho could ill spare the time to duties which had not beon rendered the lighter or tho pleasanter by, the relations in which lie stood with the director of the New Zealand Institute. Mr Colenso bitterly complained of tho neglect shown by Dr Hector to his correspondence, eighteen letters producing only two official communications. Again, tho rejection by the Institute of three of "tb'd papers written by Mr Colenso on subjects with/ which no ono.living can speak with. £0 much, authority was an act that could not Vbe , forgiven,, and we think was accepted by him as an intentional slight. Well might Mr Colenso ask who were they at Wellington to judge whether his ; papers on Maori nomenclature and trad-'tiohs were .worthy of being,included in the transactions . of the New Zealand Institute P On those subjects he writes cs cathedra, and it certainly was presumption on the part of tho committee at Wellington to put

those papers on one side as though they were of inferior merit. As it happened, the papers in question wero given to the public at the solicitation of Mr Colcnso's friends, and of others'interested in tl,-- matter treated upon, but it was at his own expense. Curiously enough the rules of the Hawke's' Bay branch did not include one giving power to the society to publish papers read before it. This omission was notified at the meeting yesterday, and a rule adopted similar to that of tho Auckland and Wellington branches. It was rather thought that by Ihe adoption of this rule Mr Colenso would have consented to. allow liihiself to be re-elected to office ; but, though he pointed out how difficult it would be to find a person in every way competent.to undertake the duties of secretary, he resolutely declined the appointment for himself. . Tho office of secretary to such a society necessarily demands peculiar qualifications, and we have no hesitation in saying that they aro not possessed by any one in Hawke's Bay to such a happy degree as by Mr Colenso. *We may woll say that his retirement leaves the society 'poor indeed.