406 



PROCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY. 



MEETING 



Held on the 18th of AntiL, 1900, at 20 Hanover Square, W. 

 G. C. Karop, Esq., Vice-President, in the Chair. 



The Minutes of the Meeting of March 21st, 1900, were read and 

 confirmed, and were signed by the Chairman. > 



The Secretary said they had only received one donation since the 

 last Meeting (in addition to exchanges and reprints) — the Journal of the 

 Beard of Agriculture for March. 



The thanks of the Society were voted to the Donor. 



The Chairman felt sure that the Fellows would regret to hear that 

 the President was so indisposed as to be quite incapable of being with 

 them that evening. He was to have given them a demonstration on the 

 structure of some Palaeozoic plants, with lantern illustrations. In his 

 unavoidable absence, however, Mr. George Murray, F.R.S., at very short 

 notice, had most kindly undertaken to give them an address on 

 Coccospheres and Rhabdospheres. 



Mr. Swift exhibited and described a new pattern Field Microscope, 

 which he thought would be found very useful for travelling, as it folded 

 up into a small compass and packed into a case about 9x3 x 3 in. 

 The stage was rather larger than the one usually fitted to so small an 

 instrument, but it was made so as to carry an Abbe condenser, and being 

 jointed it took very little additional room when folded back. In addition 

 to the Microscope the case would contain two objectives, bottles, a 

 Eousselet live-box, pipette, and forceps (see p. 379). 



The Chairman thought this was an extremely well made and finished 

 Microscope, and very ingeniously contrived to pack up into the smallest 

 possible space. It would no doubt be found very useful by travelling 

 naturalists ; it only seemed to be too good to carry about and get damaged. 



The thanks of the Meeting were voted to Mr. Swift for his exhibit. 



Mr. George Murray's address dealt with a subject which must be of 

 interest to all biologists, namely, the nature of those strange pelagic 

 organisms, the Coccospheres and Rhabdospheres. 



So long ago as 1857, Prof. Huxley described, in deep-sea soundings 



