The Sun.
London, England, 1868-08-20 00:00:00

NORWICH, WEDNESDAY.
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TO the British Asiociation the lines have often fallen in
pleasant places, but the sojourn q the savants in this "city
in an orchard"seems likely to prove exceptionally agreeable.
Beautiful for situation, replete with antiquities, success-
! fully engaged in modern Manufactures, the seat of a
bishopriC, andliossessed of a cultivated society, Norwich
is a place Peculiarly suitable for the entertainment of a
learned body such as that commencing its 38th annual
meeting here to-night. This could hardly have been
said of it once, if there was any foundation for
the quaint apostrophe of Bale : " 0 citie of
England, whose glory standeth more in bellie
chere than in serche of wisclome. God bye !"—which
seems to imply that the inhabitants were devoted
with an undue measure of enthusiasm to the duties of the
trencher. Sauntering through the streeta(Nand be-
holding even in the far distance so muelf as-a ghostnot of a
wave, it is hard to believe that the capital of East, Anglia
was once a fishing town. Yet such was actually the case,
until the arm of the sea which ran up to it got inconti.
nently choked, and henceforth confined all the bloaters to
Yarmouth. If lam rightly informed, there is an official
entry extant providing for the payment of the ground rent
of the monastery of St. Edinundsbury, on the site of which
now stands the church of St. Edmund, in a given number
of lasts of herrings. It need hardly be said that the name
of the city is essentially Saxon, Norwich being a contrac-
tion of north-wic, a northern fortress or town, and the
curious medley which the place presents in its architecture
shews that it was a constant bone of contention between
the Saxons and the Danes. If we arc to believe the old
distich familiar to all who have visited Norfolk—
" Caistor was a city when Norwich was none,
And Norwich was built of Caistor stone "
we must assume that the city sprang from the decay of
the Yenta Icenorum of the Romans, on the site
of which stands the present village of Caistor. The
historical associations of Norwich are numerous. Amongst
the most curious of these is the one relating to Henry I.
That monarch, being short of cash on the eve of a trip to
France, used this city as a pawnshop, actually depositing
the brown jewels, including the crown, with the mayor
and corporation, as security for the advance of the neces-
sary funds. I believe 2,000 marks represented the sum
the king obtained, the jewels being worth 8,000 marks;
and the corporation had absolute power of sale in case the
loan was not punctually returned.
In all my experience of strange cities, I never met with
one whose geography was half so aggravating as this.
In a walk of a quarter of a mile the unwary visitor is
deluded at least a dozen times to turn from the straight
road into what look undeniably like short cuts to the goal
he desires to reach, only to find that he is landed in what
they call here "plains "—large open spaces, many of them
containing gardens—which lead him nowhere. The only
thing at all counterbalancing this annoyance is the dis-
covery of little nests of quaint buildings which
look as if they had been transported bodily from
some old Flemish town. The castle and the cathedral—
about which more in another letter—are, fortunately, two
conspicuous landmarks, serving in some sort as the direc-
tion-posts to the traveller ; but even with these aids he is
a wise man who shall be able to find his way easily about
Norwich before he has lived there a month. Apropos of
the castle may be mentioned a curious fact. Next door to
the building there used to stand a public-house kept
by one of the officials, and here, the day before their execu•
tion, condemned criminals were allowed to exhibit them.
selves at so much per head, the money thus received being
expended in providing them with their final meal !
The arrangements for the accommodation of the Associa-
tion appear to be admirable. Several improvements are ob-
servable in the reception-room, the chief of which is that
the business connected with the issue of tickets and
the supply of information is carried on in an
apartment separate from that devoted to the
visitors for the purposes of reading and writing. The post
office which is always opened in the reception-room is this
year made available, not only for letters stamped with her
Majesty's likeness, but also for communication between
the members and associates. A large number of these have
already arrived, and, to be candid, the people of Norwich
seemed quite prepared to receive them, if charging double
prices for beds and provisions could be taken as any
proof of a hearty welcome. It is a source of
regret that the president of the Royal Geographical
Society, who is always secure of a warm welcome in
whatever section he appears, will not be present this year.
Sir Roderick is, I am told, in Switzerland, not being in
very good health. It has been hinted, but I attach little
importance to the suggestion, that he does not care to
meet Professor Sedgwick. A deputation has arrived from
Edinburgh, to urge the claims of that city upon the
council as the place of meeting in 1870. This is the first
time that the Scottish capital has made an overture
of its hospital Next the Association. Its great rival
is Liverpool. year Exeter or Plymouth will receive
the Association. To which the honour Ivill be accorded
will be decided on the last day of the present meeting.
This morning the General Committee and the Committee
of Sections met for the transaction of routine business in
St. Peter's Hall. The inaugural address of Dr. Hooker,
the president, is looked forward to with unusual interest.
Dr. Hooker is the director of the Royal Gardens, Kew.
He was at one time a surgeon on board one of
her Majesty's vessels, and has been a great traveller. llis
paper on "Insular Flowers," read at Nottingham the year
before last, leads the members to expect great things from
the new president this evening. The address will be
delivered at 8 o'clock in the Drill Hall. In addition to
the usual work of the sections and the two inevitable
soir6es, the committee have arranged for two evening
addresses—one on Friday by Mr. Fergusson, F.R.S., on
" The Archseology of Early Buddhist Monuments ;" and
one on Monday evening by Dr. Odling on " Reverse
Chemical Actions." Arrangements have also been com-
pleted for excursions to Cromer, Lynn, Hunstanton,
Walsingham, Holkham, and Yarmouth. With great
courtesy Mr. R. J. H. Harvey, M.P. and Lady Harvey
have invited all ladies and gentlemen holding Association
tickets to a d6euner at Crown Point, in the Whittingham
Grounds, a delightful spot a short distance from the city.
Mr. Harvey will convey his guests thither by steamer. It
will thus be seen that a busy week is before the Associa-
tion.

THE PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS.
Dr. Hootan, in the course of his inaugural address,
after referring to the absence of Sir Roderick Murchison
(caused, he explained, through ill-health) and of Professor
Sedgewick (who had met with an accident), stated that ho
proposed to remark on the great advances made in botany
in the last few years with a divergence into Darwinism,
after which he would allude to the early history of man-
kind. His first duty as president would be to introduce
to the Association the members of the International
Congress of Pre-historic Archaeology then assembled
in Norwich. Next he brought forward the subject
of the efforts of a committee of the council to in-
duce the Secretary for India to adopt active measures
to obtain reports on the physical form, manners, and cus-
toms of the indigenous population of India, and especially
of those tribes which are still in the habit of erecting
Megalethic monuments ; and he pointed out that within
300 miles of the capital of British India there is a tribe of
semi-savages who erect dolmens, menares, cysts, and
cromlechs, almost as gigantic as the Druidical remains of
Europe. Some interesting accounts of the habits and
customs of this Khasia people of East Bengal were
given, and the president next proceeded to detail the pro-
ceedings of a committee of the Association in reference to
obtaining the placing of the Natural History collections
of the British Museum under one central management,
and so arranged that they may be utilised in teaching the
elements of zoology and physiology, while some assistance
in this regard should he given to provincial and local
museums. On the value of museums generally as adjuncts
to instruction he dwelt at length. Turning to his
own special science, he stated that great advances had
been made during the last ten years in the depart-
ments of fossil botany and vegetable physiology. The
knowledge of coal plants had been chiefly advanced by
Geeppert and Unger on the Continent, and Dawson in
Canada, and also by Mr. Binney, of Manchester, who had
afforded much information on the least understood of the
coal measures, known as calamites, which are shewn to be
members of the family of equisetacea. A good deal was
next said of the information as to tertiary mines and on
fossil botany generally: while the subject of a series of
papers by Mr. Darwin on the fertilisation of plants, in refe-
rence to discoveries in physiological botany, was elaborately
expounded, dissertations on cowslips and primroses being
specially dwelt upon • and it was stated that the disco-
veries mentioned had added whole chapters to the princi-
ples of botany, and that what Faraday's discoveries were to
telegraphy Darwin's would prove to rural economy.
Having thoroughly exhausted this subject, the president
next went on to discuss the position now held in the
scientific world by Mr. Darwin's theory of the origin of
species by natural selection, and contended that the trea-
tise was not, as had been asserted, declining in
scientific favour ; but, so far from being a thing of the
past, was an accepted doctrine with every philosophical
naturalist, was elsewhere gaining adherents steadily,
and was an avowed favourite with the rising schools
of naturalists. This assertion was borne out by
elaborate statements and illustrations, by which
objections taken to the system on geological,
astronomical, physical, and metaphysical grounds weie
answered. The next phase of the address was
devoted to the prospects which the present meeting of
the Association opened. A new science—that of the early
history of mankind, or pro-historic archreology, including
the origin of language and of art—had dawned upon the
scientific world ; and one of its discoveries was, that man
had inhabited the earth for many thousands of years be-
fore the historic period. At this point the deli-
cate subject of the respective attitudes of religion
and science was discussed, and indications given
possibility of their being able
to
of
wthaelko desirablenessd!i hand-in-hand
la
datogether. It was centers:le 1 a
great number of eminent clergymen of all denominations
had adorned science by their writings and religion I.y their
lives, and much was said to prove that professors of reli-
gion need not have that fear of science by which many of
them seemed to be influenced ; and it was urged that
there should be a union in search after trutl-, as it refers
to the spiritual history an:l condition of mai of the
archeologist and the religious teacher. After en-
larging and insisting on the value of science in
establishing new facts and exposing old errors, the presi-
dent concluded by saying that the bond Al'hiell unites the
physical and spiritual history of man, and the forces which
manifest themselves in the alternate victories of mind and
matter in the actions of the individual, are, of all subjects
that physics and psychology have revealed to us, the most
absorbing. and perhaps Inscrutable. In the investigation
of these ph nmena is wrapped up lie past and the future,
the whence and the whither of man's existence.; and after
a knowledge of these the human soul still yearns and
Passionately strives.
Dr. Hooker resumed his seat amid loud cheers, and
a cordial vote of thanks for his address was moved byc Pro-
fessor Huxley, seconded by Professor Tyndall, an sup-
rted the Mayor of Nozwieboyho heartily* welgomed
tYt_