343 



A hearty vote of thanks was accorded the President for his 

 interesting communication. 



Mr. Taverner exhibited a very fine series of water-mites 

 (Hydrachnidae), mostly mounted in glycerine jelly. 



At the meeting of the Club held on January 19th, 1906, 

 Dr. E. J. Spitta, F.R.M.S., F.R.A.S., President, in the Chair, 

 the minutes of the meeting held on December 15th, 1905, were 

 read and confirmed. 



Messrs. C. E. Heath, W. R. Clarke, B. Taplin, E. A. Robins, 

 E. J. Duffield, 0. W. Murray, P. E. Davies, J. Wilson, F. W. 

 Hobbs, and the Rev. A. A. Dauncey were balloted for and duly 

 elected members of the Club. 



After the nomination of officers for election at the meeting to 

 be held on February 16th, the Hon. Secretary announced that two 

 papers of an extremely technical nature — "On Drepanidotaeriia 

 undulata" and "On a New Tapeworm, Drepanidotaeriia sagitta" 

 — had been communicated by Mr. T. B. Rosseter, F.R.M.S. 



Mr. R. T. Lewis, F.R.M.S., then delivered a lecture on "The 

 Senses of Insects," more particularly dealing with sight and 

 hearing. As it was only possible for us to judge of these senses 

 by comparison with our own capacities and experiences, it 

 appeared necessary at the outset to have some idea as to how 

 such sensations were conveyed to us, and if we could understand 

 something as to this, we should be able more intelligently to 

 recognise analogous structures in insects, and to reasonably infer 

 that similar results might follow. The structure of the human 

 eye and its functions as an optical instrument were too well 

 known to need further description. We knew that a picture 

 was formed by a lens, and that by the action of the light which 

 produced this picture upon the retina sensations were conveyed 

 to the brain by the optic nerve, and the phenomena of vision 

 resulted. The microscope was competent to reveal the minute 

 structure of the cornea, lens, and to some extent of the sensitive 

 retina ; but how the sensations excited by the action of the light 

 were conveyed to and understood by the mind was beyond the 

 power of the instrument to demonstrate, so that in endeavouring 

 to understand a subject where demonstration of fact was im- 

 possible, we could only suggest some hypothesis or theory, and 



