NEW ZEALAND INSTITUTE AND BOTANIC GARDEN BOARD.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5713, 22 July 1879, Page 3

NEW ZEALAND INSTITUTE AND BOTANIC GARDEN BOARD.

A meeting of the governors of the above Board was held at the Colonial Museum at 11 a.m. yesterday, his Excellency the Governor (the president) in the chair. The members present were the Hon. Mr. Mantell, Hon. Mr. Waterhouse, Yen. Archdeacon Stock, Mr. T. Mason, and Dr. Hector. The annual reports were considered and adopted for presentation to Parliament. The institute shows 1135 members on the roll The statement of accounts shows the receipts for the year to have been £658 Bs. 10d., and the expenditure £517 12s. 7d., but there is still something due to the publishers. The reports of the departments show that the Museum has been visited by 16,200 persons, exclusive of Sundays, on which days the attendance is very large. Over 12,000 specimens have been added to the collections, and 235 analyses made in the laboratory. The general results and progress of. the work in the geological, survey, the meteorological, and other departments, are also given,

The Botanic Garden report describes the work done during the year towards the improvement of the grounds, and the annual statement of accounts gives the following as the revenue received, viz., balance in September, 1878, £l6O 16s. 7d.;.vote for IS7S-9, £300; share of rents from city reserves (18/S and 9), £154 2s. Gd.; sale of plants, £39 35.; sale of hay, £66 ss. Total, £729 7s. Id. The expenditure was as follows :—Garden work, &c., £377 12s. 6d.; materials, timber, &0., £27 2s. 9d.; erecting shade house, £SO 18s. 4d.; hay cutting and making, £63 165.; purchase of plants, £2 ; miscellaneous £l42s. Id.; balance in hand, £lB4 15s. sd. Total £720 7s. The following la a copy of a letter received by Dr. Hector from Professor Max Muller : “ 7, Norham Gardens, “Oxford, March 25,1879. “ Dear Sir, —I have received your letter of 31st December, enclosing a certificate of my election as an honorary member of the New Zealand Institute. I highly appreciate the honor which the President and members of your institute have conferred upon me, and I luu e to request that you will convey to them at their next meeting the expression of my sincere gratitude. “ I have long watched with great interest the important work carried on by some of the members of your institute in rescuing whatever can still be rescued of the antiquities, the dialects, the customs, and religious traditions of native tribes. Though this kind of work may meet at present with far less acknowledgment than it deserves, it will not be lost in the future. What would be given now if the Greeks and Romans had seen the importance of such linguistic and ethnological researches, and left us a short grammar of Etruscan, or a sketch of the religion of the Pelasgians, instead of some of the poems of Pindar or Ovid ? “ Depend upon it, nothing concerning native tribes, particularly those that are likely to become extinct, can he without real scientific value. It is the result of the continuous working of millions of human minds and hearts, and however unmeaning at first sight, or even repulsive, it deserves to be preserved from oblivion for the benefit of those who come after us. —I am, &c. “F. Max Muller.”