Professor C. A. Cotton, to whom I should like to record my thanks and great appreciation for the able manner in which he managed the Transactions.

During the past year Volume 85, Parts 2, 3 and 4, and Volume 86, Parts 1 and 2 (combined parts) have been issued, representing a total printing of 713 pages. From this it will be see that the total volume of printing contained in the Transactions is steadily increasing year by year and is bearing out the estimates which we made some years ago for increased finance for the printing of research papers offered to the journal.

For reasons outside the control of the Editors, the volume numbers have again slipped by one year into arrears, so that in Volumes 86 and 87 it has been decided to issue double parts in order that by the end of 1959 the volume numbers should again be up to date.

No Bulletin has been issued during the past financial year, and no papers were offered which could come into the Bulletin category.

The editing of the Society's Transactions, with the ever increasing volume of papers being offered, continues to absorb a considerable amount of my time, even though all the geological papers are handled by Professor Cotton. The mere mechanics of keeping the Transactions rolling takes a considerable amount of the Editor's time, apart altogether from the normal functions of editing. As the physical size of the Transactions increases, it seems to me to be inevitable that the Society will have to give consideration to either appointing a permanent Editor as a paid servant of the Society, or to increasing the Associate Editors in such a way as to relieve some of the pressure on the Editor.

Finally, I would like to record again my appreciation of the help I have received from Professor Cotton, the numerous scientists who have acted as referees of papers, and from the Manager of the Otago Daily Times Co. Printing Department, Mr. A. A. Doig.

J. T. Salmon,