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an Australian, and Mr H. E. Maude, an Englishman, were selected for the appointments of Secretary-General and Deputy SecretaryGeneral respectively, and notification of their acceptance of these positions was received prior to the second session. The second session was held in Sydney in October-November, 1948, the agreement having been ratified on 29 July, 1948. The Commissioner's first decision, made on the recommendation of the Working Committee, was that Noumea should be the permanent seat of the Commission. The appointments of the Secretary-General and the Deputy Secretary-General were confirmed. Dr L. G. M. Baas-Becking (Netherlands) was appointed Deputy Chairman of the Research Council, and two of the three full-time members of the Research Council were appointed. The New Zealand nominee for the Member for Social Development, Dr J. W. Davidson, was offered the third appointment, but was unable to accept the position. Mr Maude then became Acting Member for Social Development, and in early March, 1949, one of the New Zealand Commissioners, Brigadier Hunt, was seconded to the Commission to assist the Secretary-General in administrative matters. Among the thirteen part-time members of the Research Council also appointed at this time were two New Zealanders, Sir Peter Buck, K.C.M.G., and Dr J. C. Lopdell, Chief Medical Officer, Western Samoa. The Commissioners suggested a very comprehensive work programme which they commended to the early attention of the Research Council. Preliminary arrangements were made for the first meeting of the South Pacific Conference to be held at Suva in the last week of April, 1950. This Conference will be the first occasion on which representatives of the Native peoples of the South Pacific have assembled to discuss common problems with which the Commission is concerned. Since November the full-time members of the Research Council have commenced their duties. Acting upon resolutions of the second session, they attended the Seventh Pacific Science Congress in New Zealand in order to make as many contacts as possible with scientists already working in the area. They then set out on a tour of the administrative centres of the South Pacific region in order to meet the people with whom they would have to co-operate in the future and to get an over-all picture of the area so that they would be able correctly to assess the relative urgency of the various projects suggested to them. At the beginning of March, 1949, the Secretariat officially moved into its new quarters in the Pentagon Building, Noumea. The first meeting of the Research Council will be held there in late April, and the third session of the Commission in early May. It is planned