XII.-Proceedings of the Asiatic Society.

Thursday Evening 30th January, 1834.

The Rev. Principal W. H. MILL, Vice-President, in the chair.

After reading the proceedings of the last meeting, the Society proceeded to ballot for the officers of the ensuing year, when Sir C. T. METCALFE, Sir J. FRANKS, Rev. Principal MILL, and Mr. W. McNAGHTEN, were elected Vice-Presidents: and

J. Tytler, Esq. Capt. A. Troyer,
Baboo Ramcomul Sen, J. R. Col-

vin, Esq.

Capt. W. N. Forbes,

C. E. Trevelyan, Esq.

Dr. J. T. Pearson,

D. Hare, Esq.

Dr. N. Wallich,

were elected Members of the Committee of Papers.

Messrs. HAMILTON, MACKENZIE, STOPFORD, and BEATTIE, proposed at the last Meeting, were unanimously elected Members.

Before proceeding to the business of the meeting, Mr. J. T. PEARSON proposed the following resolutions, which were carried unanimously:

1. That the thanks of the Society be tendered to Mr. J. PRINSEP, for his liberality in circulating copies of the Journal, edited by him, gratuitously to the Members.

2. That under existing circumstances it is expedient that the Society pay for all copies distributed to its members for the future, as well as for the past year.

Read a letter from W. E. FRERE, Esq. Secretary, Bombay Branch Royal Asiatic Society, acknowledging the receipt of the 17th and 18th volume of the Asiatic Researches, and requesting to be furnished with the 15th and 16th volumes. Also letters from H. HARKNESS, Esq. Sec. Roy. Asiatic Society, and from J. FOUHALL, Esq. Sec. of the British Museum, advising receipt of the 17th volume.

Read a letter from J. TYTLER, Esq. Sec. Oriental Translation Committee, regretting that the state of their funds would not admit of their undertaking the publication of Mr. YATES' Nalodaya, in India, and proposing either to transmit it to the Home Translation Committee, or to subscribe for copies, should the author prefer printing it on his own account. referred to Mr. YATES.

To be

The Secretary read the following report on the accounts and proceeding of the past year.

Annual Report.

“In drawing up a report upon the affairs of the Society for the past year, I shall confine myself to points connected with the finances and constitution of the Society; the literary and scientific objects which have been brought forward during the year have been already noticed in the printed proceedings of the monthly meetings, and are therefore well known to all the members. The mode of publishing these proceedings in detail, and furnishing lists of all the books presented, members elected, and papers read, has only been adopted for the last two years; but it has already been

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of material benefit to distant members, who have become more connected with the main body through these means, and have frequently applied for books which they have seen announced, or have taken part in discussions going forward within our walls, and have become more active contributors of new facts in the literature and science of the vast country within our range. The good effect of publishing and spreading abroad at once all that goes forward in our Society cannot be better proved than by instancing the letter read this evening from the Secretary to the Bombay Branch of the Asiatic Society, which was before ignorant that any volume of Researches had been published later than the fourteenth ! That the published Researches are not so wellknown, or so generally distributed, as they ought to be, may be implied from the complaint in the third volume of Professor HEEREN'S Historical Researches, that he was only able to get access to the first twelve volumes of the Transactions. All this will now be corrected through the activity of our agent, the Boden Professor, whose interference has already been visibly productive of amendment in the despatches of books from Europe, latterly left too much at the discretion of the book-seller.

The number of members at present on the list is 85: the diminution during the past year has been, by death, 2; by retirement to England, and other causes, 10: the addition from new elections has been 14.

The receipts and disbursements, as abstracted from the collector's general account, are exhibited in the accompanying statement. They contain many items belonging properly to the last year; such as the printing of the last two volumes, which have necessitated an encroachment on the stock of the Society to the extent of 7500 rupees. Strict economy has however been preserved with regard to the expences of the present year—the whole, including a remittance of £100 to our agent in England, being within the sum absolutely collected in the same period, and leaving a balance in hand, if the outstanding quarterly bills be included, of nearly five thousand rupees.

With regard to the collection of the quarterly contributions, the late unfortunate failures have necessarily caused much inconvenience both to the collector and to absent members, and to this cause may be attributed the apparently large amount on the defaulters' list. Still there are some names against which too large a balance appears to stand as due, and it is for the Society to determine, whether the members thus continuing in default are to be allowed the privilege of calling themselves

such, while the burden falls upon their more regular brethren. The contributions of eighty members (without entrance fees) would be 5120, whereas only 3900 were collect ed; and in this sum is included 302 rupees, from the Right Honorable the Governor General, the Patron of the Society, who, contrary to former precedents, has liberally directed that he should be charged as an ordinary paying member. The Society is aware that an endeavour has been made, though it is not yet matured, to introduce the option of compounding for the quarterly subscriptions, and I cannot but anticipate that this measure, if adopted, will prove more productive to our finances, and more convenient and agreeable to most of the members. It will also save the expence and delay of collection.

It has been my desire to lessen in some degree the burthen to paying members, by distributing the Journal gratis to them during the past year: the result has not proved so encouraging as I could have wished, but with some modification I hope still to be able to continue the measure.

Of the subscription for Mr. H. H. WILSON'S Bust, Rs. 1080 have been collected and remitted to that gentleman: no intimation has been yet received of the probable cost of the bust.

Although it has not been thought prudent to commence a new volume of Researches, or even the printing of the Index of the 18 volumes, sanctioned by the Committee of Papers, the press has not been idle, and I have the pleasure to lay on the table a copy just completed of M. CSOMA DE KOROS' Tibetan Dictionary, printed at the expence of Government, and under the auspices of the Society, as reported on the 20th Feb. last. M. CSOMA's Grammar will now he put in hand, and the whole completed in the course of the present spring.

The plan of increasing the museum has remained uncompleted for the want of means, as the rooms on the ground-floor cannot be adapted to the purpose without terracing them anew and enclosing the arched openings to the north. Mr. PEARSON was induced to accept the office of gratuitous Curator in the month of July last, and an assistant curator had been brought on the strength of the establishment some months previously, who has been employed in cleaning and preserving the objects now in our cabinets. But it must be obvious that this branch of the Society cannot flourish, while those who might be expected to cherish and support it are constantly engaged in other duties and reside at too great a distance even to pay the rooms an occasional visit. One new cabinet has been constructed to receive a collection of shells arranged by Dr. PEARSON, and the geological almirahs have become nearly filled with contributions from various quarters.

With regard to the Library, it seems essentially necessary to incur some expence for the better preservation of the books, especially the valuable records of other Societies, presented periodically in paper covers. I beg to propose that some professional person be appointed binder to the Society, who may be entrusted with the binding of all new books on fixed rates, under the Committee of Papers.

The furash of the Museum, a very old man, who has been with the Society since its first establishment, has been allowed to retire on a trifling pension without causing any additional charge to the establishment.

We have to deplore the loss of two Members, by death, during the past year, one of them, Captain HERBERT, is so well known by the high services he has rendered to science in India, that the tribute of an obituary testimony to his memory becomes

his due, and I have only to regret that I am not yet provided with the materials for a sketch of his short but eminently useful career.

By departure to Europe, our loss of members has been still more severe, but it may be hardly fair to consider that a deprivation which but changes the scene and sphere of their exertions and utility.

I have purposely refrained from alluding to the labours of a more exalted nature, which have brightened the proceedings of the past year, because I consider it to be the privilege of the highest officer of the Society to review the objects and progressive success of the institution over which he presides. Severe indisposition has unfortunately placed it out of the power of our President to restore the laudable custom of an annual address on the present occasion; which is the more to be regretted, as this is the jubilee anniversary of the day on which the illustrious founder of the Society was elected its first President. The close of that eventful period finds the parent Society shorn of all its exclusive honors, and forming but one, perhaps the humblest, of the numerous bodies associated in Europe and in India, for the prosecution of "inquiries into the history, antiquities, the natural productions, arts, sciences, and literature of Asia." The tree which was auspiciously planted by the great Sir WILLIAM JONES, to use his own expression, has long since produced its fairest blossoms, and its most exquisite fruit. It has spread its roots in distant lands, where the arts of cultivation are better understood, and the value of its produce can be more skilfully developed ; but we must not forget that we here assemble under the shade of the original tree, and that however decayed the parent stock may have become, while its more vigorous branches are taking root in France, Germany, and England, still it is to the Asiatic Society of Bengal that belongs with propriety the motto assumed by one of its illustrious scions, "Quot rami tot arbores."

Library.

The following books were presented :

Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, 2nd part of the 3rd volume, new series, and the Proceedings of the 10th Annual Meeting of the Society, with the Reports of the Council, Auditors, and Committee of Correspondence, held on Saturday, May 11th, 1833.--By the Society.

Proceedings of the Geological Society, Nos. 30 and 31, with a list of its members for 1833.-By the Society.

Garcin De Tassy, Appendice aux Rudimens de la Langue Hindoustani.-By the Author.

Marcoz, Erreur des Astronomes et des Geometres.-By the Author. Journal Asiatique, Nos. 59 and 66.-By the Asiatic Society of Paris. Journal of Medical Science, No. 1, vol. 1st.-By Messrs. J. Grant, and J. T. Pearson, Editors.

Meteorological Register for December, 1833.-By the Surveyor General.

The following works received from the Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland.

No. 414, Atkinson's Customs and Manners of the Women in Persia, and their domestic superstitions :

Shea's Translation of Mirkhond's History of the early Kings of Persia.
Travels of Macarius, parts 3rd and 4th, translated by F. C. Balfour.

The following books, received from the book-sellers :
Heeren's, Asiatic Nations, 3 vols.

Rosen, Corporis Radicum Sanscritum Prolusio, 1 vol. P.
Radices Sanscritæ, 1 vol.

Rig Veda Specimen, 1 vol.

Freytag, Arabischen Verskunst, 1 vol.

Dictionary Arabico-Latinum, 1st and 2nd vols.

Kosegarten, Chrestomathia Arabica, 1 vol.

Benary, Nalodaya Sanscritum carmen, 1 vol.

Bohlien, Carmen Arabicum Amali dictum, 1 vol. P,
Jernour's Treatise on Languages, 1 vol.

Tyerman and Bennet's voyages and travels, 2 vols.
Prichard's Celtic Nations, 1 vol.

Upham's Sacred and Historical books of Ceylon, 3 vols.
Malcolm on the Government of India, 1 vol.

Brydges Dynasty of the Kajars, 1 vol.

Fairholme's Geology of Scripture, 1 vol.

Historical Sketch of Sanscrit Literature, 1 vol.

Alison's Physiology and Pathology, 1 vol.

David's Turkish Grammar, 1 vol.

British India, 3 vols.

Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia, middle ages, 1 vol.

Wilken's Mohammedi Filii Chondschahi, vulgo Mirchondi Historia Gasnevidarum, 1 vol.

Lassen, Gymnosophista, 1 vol. P.

Physical.

A native talwár, and three water-fowls, from Assam, were presented by Dr. BURLINI.

Read, a letter from G. A. BUSHBY, Esq. Secretary to Government, communicating an account of the boring experiment lately conducted by Captain GRANT in Cutch. [Printed in the present number.]

Read extracts from the Third Annual Report of the Society of the Natural History at the Mauritius, presented by M. JUL. DESJARDINS. Secretaire et Membre Fondateur, dated 24th August, 1832.

Read a note from Captain JENKINS, forwarding specimens of a rich ore of mammellated and stalactitic manganese, found in the Ajmír mines; and also of shot manufactured on the spot by Captain DIXON from the Ajmír lead. Read a letter from Colonel WATSON, presenting further specimens of coal, iron, and other productions of the Kasya hills.

Read a note from Ensign NEWBOLD, forwarding the specimens of granity, gold dust, and plants referred to in his account of an excursion to the summit of Mount Ophir in the Malay peninsula.

[See a note by Dr. WALLICH on the plants, inserted in the present No.] Read a letter from Captain P. T. CAUTLEY, Superintendant of the Doab Canal, announcing his discovery of the remains of an ancient city underground, in the neighbourhood of Seharanpur, and presenting two silver and 24 copper coins found there, and a fragment of bone.

[This announcement is printed in the present number.]