354 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [1880. 



time find plants which have a great abundance of female flowers, — 

 indeed, sometimes plants which are wholly female. 



In the case of these chestnuts he would not say it was a want 

 of nutrition which made these normally male flowers become fe- 

 male. That was not his view of the case. On the contrary, it 

 was that better nutritive advantages prevailed to influence the 

 female sex, and these long spikes of chestnut fruit proved the 

 fact rather than interposed an objection. It was a simple and 

 uncontroverted fact that these young chestnuts were being 

 nourished, were imbibing nutrition, wdiile if they had been nor- 

 mal male flowers, they Avould have been dead months ago. It 

 was evident to the senses that nutrition was in the end involved, 

 and w^e only had to consider at what point of early cell life its 

 influence was felt. The old idea would probably be that the 

 question of nutrition followed the " fiat " which made sex, while 

 his views deduced from the numerous facts he had published on 

 the question, were th;it nutrition, in its various phases, was itself 

 the law-maker. As to the greater power behind this, which 

 decreed that this should be the law, ;nid that the law should pro- 

 duce such even divisions in the proportion of the sexes, it was 

 another question. He only claimed that his discoveries had 

 brought us a step nearer to this greater cause. 



Note. — I have since learned through au old resident in the vicinity, that 

 the large tree has borne such burs for many years, and that it is known 

 throughout the neighborhood as the "he " tree. — I. C. M. 



OCTOBEK, 12. 



Tlie President, Dr. RuscHENP.KiKiEU. in tlie cliair, 

 Thirly-five ])ersons i)rv'sent. 



October 19. 

 Dr. I\. S. Kenderdine in the chair. 



Twenty-eiglit persons present. 



The Publiciition Committee reported in favor of pul>lishing the 

 following papers in the Journal of the Academy: — 



" The Parasites of the Termites," by Jos. Leidy, M. D. 



" Remarks on Bathygnathus orientalis," by Jos. Leidj-, M. D. 



