INAUGURAL ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. 



detached during the essential act of impregnation in phanerogams 

 and ultimately converted into the future embryo (which was in fact 

 equivalent to saying that a portion of the male organism was 

 directly transformed into a new being) ; that a living histologist of 

 recognised eminence, as such, misinterpreterl the nature of certain 

 vegetation-like appearances and actually described them as repre- 

 senting an entire new genus of fungi, probably of the highest im- 

 portance in relation to the production of febrile disease, and yet all 

 the while he was only dealing with the phenomena of coagulation — 

 when such errors occur, we need exercise care. In fact, the so-called 

 sheep-pox organisms, just mentioned, had no existence, as such, 

 except in the imagination of the observer ; and thus we were 

 furnished with another striking illustration of the dangers which 

 beset the very special specialist who, in this instance, was 

 admitted to possess unusual skill in the employment of modern 

 microscopic appliances, aided by tlie most approved chemical and 

 mechanical tests. Egregious blunders of this sort are apt to bring 

 microscopic research into undeserved contempt. Again, under the 

 generic title of Forbesia, an eminent naturalist some few years back 

 described as a new and gigantic form of polyp a structure which 

 afterwards turned out to be nothing more than the intestinal canal 

 of a marine annelid (the explanation of the error being that the 

 viscus was torn from the worm by the action of the dredge employed 

 in taking soundings, and thus simulated a new and separate 

 organism) ; and lastly — for one cannot, notwithstanding the 

 abundance of material, go on multiplying instances of scientific 

 imperfection all the evening — tliere remains the recent confession 

 respecting Bathyhius, another very natural misinterpretation which 

 was also the outcome of a deep-sea sounding. 



Who amongst us that has worked for any length of time with 

 the microscope in the old fashioned way has not fallen into errors of a 

 more or less similar and palpable kind ? Let us be modest, and 

 consider the lessons which such frailties teach. For myself, when 

 any fresh mishap of this order occurs I am always reminded of the 

 early error which the illustrious Hippocrates made when, with un- 

 aided vision, he mistook a natural suture of the cranium for a 

 fracture of the skull, and had the manliness afterwards to confess 

 his mistake. That, said Celsus, was acting like a truly great man. 

 " Little geniuses," it was added, " conscious to themselves that they 

 have nothing to spare, cannot bear the slightest diminution of their 



