276 Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington. 



ists now have their own society and have little to do any more 

 with the Biological Society, how are we others to know? 



In the spring of 1893 (meeting of April 22) 0. F. Cook, then 

 recently back from Liberia, read a paper on the natural history 

 of that interesting colony of expatriated Afro-Americans. In 

 talking of the termites, he referred to the fact that the queen 

 lays eggs at the rate of about eight hundred thousand or more 

 a day. This happened to be, I think, the only meeting in the 

 history of the society which was attended by the well-known 

 chemist, Dr. H. W. Wiley. Whether he was drowsy and lost 

 track of the subject, and simply caught the word eggs and the 

 number, or whether he intended to be humorous as usual, he 

 nudged me and said in a whisper, "By George, what a fortune, 

 with eggs at twenty-five cents a dozen!" I tell this story not 

 only because it happened, but to remind you that there was once 

 a time when hens' eggs only cost twenty-five cents a dozen. 



Before this there was an interesting situation at the meeting 

 of February 7, 1891, when Henry Fairfield Osborn came over 

 from New York and gave a talk on cretaceous mammals. He 

 was showing how a fossil jaw-bone on which Prof. 0. C. Marsh 

 had founded a new family, and a part of a skull on which the 

 same authority had founded another family, and some back 

 teeth on which he had founded a genus or some other division, 

 and some front teeth on which he had founded another genus or 

 some other division, all belonged, not to the same skull, but to 

 the same species. I was much embarrassed in the course of this 

 interesting exposition when the door of the assembly room 

 opened and Professor Marsh walked in. I did not know that 

 he was in Washington. As a matter of fact, my embarrassment 

 was not shared by Osborn, who I think rather welcomed a dis- 

 cussion of his paper. But before he finished the door opened 

 again and Professor Marsh went out. Was he angry? I don't 

 know. 



Not long ago, at one of our meetings, when General Wilcox 

 presented to the society, for Colonel Roosevelt, a copy of one of 

 the latter's books I told briefly the story of the only appearance 

 before the society of the only naturalist President of the United 

 States. It is worth repeating and perhaps may be made a mat- 

 ter of permanent record. When the program committee of the 

 society was arranging the papers for the meeting of May 8, 1897, 



