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Bee brought before the Club, and upon which many of the members would 

 be very glad to get some information. The first part of the paper men- 

 tioned dissecting under the microscope with an erector. Now the ordinary 

 form of erector was excellent as applied to a telescope, but under a micro- 

 scope it was simply abominable. There were, however, various kinds of 

 erectors, and one which had been shown by Professor Abbe, made by Zeiss, 

 was about the best he had seen. It consisted merely of a single achromatic 

 combination of about two inches focus, with a stop placed above it, and it 

 gave a beautiful definition. If they took an achromatic doublet and put it into 

 a tube with a smallish aperture above it, and in its solar focus, and then 

 placed it in the tube of the microscope, they would find it would prove a far 

 finer erecting glass than those generally used. 



Mr. E. T. Newton said that some time since he had the advantage of 

 speaking to Mr. Loy upon this subject, and, particularly upon the best 

 methods of holding very small insects ; that gentleman suggested a very 

 admirable plan, which consisted in taking an ordinary lead pencil, and stick- 

 ing a piece of shoemaker's wax on the end of it, to which the insect was 

 caused to adhere. He could in this manner manipulate a flea, and by remov- 

 ing first the integument, and then putting the insect into water, the various 

 parts would begin to swell out in such a way that dissection was greatly 

 facilitated. Whilst admitting the great value of dissection as a means of 

 understanding insect anatomy, he wished to call attention to the great value 

 also of sections, which often gave information as to the relative connection 

 of the various parts which could not be otherwise obtained, and although 

 they were not, perhaps, of much use in such cases as that of the alimentary 

 canal, they were of the greatest value in forming a clear idea of other parts, 

 such as the head. Mr. Newton then proceeded to show, by means of draw- 

 ings upon the black-board, certain particulars of the highest interest and 

 importance, which had been made out by means of sections of the heads of 

 Ants and Wasps. 



Mr. T. C. White said that he had felt at first inclined to apologise for the 

 poverty of his paper, but certainly should not now do so, seeing that it had 

 been the means of bringing out the very interesting remarks which they had 

 just heard from Mr. Newton. His object in bringing the matter forward was 

 to try and incite others to the study of the comparative anatomy of insects. 

 Cutting sections successfully was, however, a matter which required a 

 delicacy and manipulative skill which '* only a Newton'' could command! 

 With regard to an erecting glass, he was fully aware of its many disadvan- 

 tages when used with instruments of ordinary construction, particularly as 

 the instruments had to be used for dissecting purposes when in the upright 

 position ; if he could afford a Stephenson's binocular, of course it would be 

 more comfortable. One more hint he would give, and that was if they 

 wished to dissect insects in the morning, tbey should not, for the sake of 

 steady hauds, smoke too much at night. 



The thanks of the meeting were unanimously voted to Mr White for his 

 paper. 



Announcements of meetings for the ensuing month were then made, and 



