224 the president's address. 



One would have supposed that of all things in this world, dust 

 was one that might he profitably studied with the aid of the micro- 

 scope, and that its investigation belonged to the province of the 

 microscopic observer. Indeed, it was pretty generally known that 

 dust had been very successfully investigated by many microscopists ; 

 but the results were to be put aside in order that a new philosophy 

 of dust might be preached. Dust, it was shown, must be re-studied 

 from the very beginning, and last year it was formally announced 

 that up to that time the world had made a very grave mistake in 

 supposing that the dust of its air consisted of inorganic matter. 

 The world had been in error, and was then to be enlightened for 

 the first time. The dust particles were not to be shown under the 

 microscope, because, in this way, the great question would have 

 been settled at once, in which case there would have been no real 

 philosophy of dust. People would have seen the various particles 

 composing the dust, the bits of hair, and feather, and cotton, and 

 wool, and starch, and fungi, and other organic matters, as well as 

 the soot and particles of sand and other inorganic substances. 

 These would have been demonstrated, as in a moment, and 

 might have been exhibited to all. True, generations of micro- 

 scopic observers had already studied dust, and had figured over 

 and over again the organic matters lately, for the first time, 

 supposed by physical authority and the world, to be absent 

 from dust ; but it was urged dust had never been properly illumi- 

 nated before, neither had the terrible morbific properties of dust 

 been assumed until that time. Thenceforth the great dust ques- 

 tion became of painful, of thrilling interest, and everyone asked his 

 neighbour if he had heard the last new discovery in dust. Then 

 came the consideration of dust in the air, dust in the water, dust 

 in the sick room, dust at rest, dust in motion, rising dust, and 

 falling dust, filtered and precipitated dust, life-giving dust, life- 

 destroying dust, fever dust, ague dust, cholera dust, ponderable and 

 imponderable dust, cosmic dust, comet dust, cloud dust, and sky 

 dust; dust of the imagination, dust historical, dust poetical; dust 

 to be burnt, dust to be suspended, dust to subside, dust to be dis- 

 persed, to be collected, to be separated, to be studied and 

 contemplated, and looked at in every way, except through a 

 magnifying glass, for by that simple operation, the whole nature 

 of dust was to be ascertained for once and for all ; its organic 

 constituents distinguished from its inorganic ingredients, the 



