During his Presidential Address to the PNHAS in 1889, the Rev. Lach-Syzrma expressed his feelings on the value of fieldwork:

Lach-Syzrma's reference to ‘healthy recreation’ aside, his speech could just as easily have been referring to a whole range of activities and facilities provided by the Society, such as evening conversaziones, museum displays and more occasional events such as exhibitions and bazaars. The PNHAS was not unique in doing so; all of the other scientific societies in Cornwall provided at least some of these facilities for their members. In fact, these activities were common across Britain and helped to constitute what Fyfe and Lightman have referred to as a ‘cultural marketplace’ – the diverse ‘sites, products and experiences’ that were on offer to the Victorian scientific consumer. The chapter is organized around these diverse sites, products and experiences. It begins with a discussion of the significance of a permanent home for local science, and goes on to examine the museum, the conversazione, the exhibition and the fieldsite in turn, both in general context and in relation to the practice of Cornish science.

Despite a vogue for fieldclubs in Victorian Britain, the majority of scientific societies in Britain placed great weight on having their own property. According to Allen, ‘status was founded on property – and a propertyless body, it was assumed, must be no less contemptible and ineffective than a propertyless man or woman’. It is for these reasons that peripatetic natural history organizations like the Berwickshire Club were in the exception (even if, given the lack of rent, they tended to do rather better financially than their building-bound contemporaries) and why so many other amateur scientific societies chose to locate their activities within designated spaces and govern their activities along heavily prescribed calendars and itineraries.