224 LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. 



tiort. We can trace the succession of events, but the statements of 

 the time required to bring about these events are based on de- 

 ductions from the accompanying or resultant physical or biological 

 phenomena, and must differ according to the estimate of the various 

 observers. So all the interval between our own day and the glacial 

 epoch is, as we express time, very great, though small relatively to 

 the history of the globe. It must, however, be admitted to repre- 

 sent an appreciable fraction of the time that has elapsed since we 

 meet with the first record of dicotyledonous plants in the earth's 

 strata. As we have seen, the species constituting the British Flora 

 then possessed all the characters which are now used to distinguish 

 them as independent species. For instance, the somewhat minute 

 peculiarities which separate Salix herbacea from 8. polaris were 

 present in the plants which grew in glacial times in Britain, and 

 they have not been added to or even intensified in the living plants 

 of the two species, although the changed physical environment has 

 driven the one north, within the arctic circle, and the other to the 

 tops of the higher mountains. And what is true of these two 

 Willows is true of all the other plants which have hitherto been 

 discovered in the glacial beds. The mosses and ferns, the gymno- 

 sperms and angiosperms, exhibit the same characters, without 

 addition or modification, as their living descendants." 



On a ballot taking place for new members of Council, the 

 following were declared to be elected : — Dr. P. H. Carpenter, 

 Dr. J. W. Meiklejohn, Mr. E. B. Poulton, Dr. D. Sharp, and 

 Prof. C. Stewart. On a ballot taking place for President and 

 officers, the following were declared to be elected : — President, 

 Prof. Charles Stewart; Secretaries, B. D. Jackson and W. P. 

 Sladen ; Treasurer, Frank Crisp. — The Linnean Society's Gold 

 Medal for the year 1890 was then formally awarded and presented 

 to Professor Huxley for his researches in Zoology. 



June 5. — Prof. Charles Stewart, President, in the chair. — 

 Messrs. Harvey Gibson and W. F. Kirby were admitted and Messrs. 

 W. H. Beeby and S. Gasking were elected Fellows of the Society. 

 — The President then nominated as Vice-Presidents for the year 

 Messrs. W. Carruthers, P. Martin Duncan, J. G. Baker, and F. 

 Crisp. — Mr. H. Little exhibited and made some remarks upon a 

 remarkable Aroid, AmorphophaUus titanum, which had flowered for 

 the first time in this country. — Mr. James Groves exhibited a 

 specimen of an Orobanche parasitic upon a Pelargonium. — The 

 following papers were then read and discussed : — Mr. G. F. Scott 

 Elliot, "On a collection of plants made by him in Madagascar"; 

 Rev. G. Henslow, " On Weismann's Theory of Heredity applied to 

 plants"; Mr. Harvey Gibson, " On the development of the tetra- 

 sporangia in Bhabdocorton Rothii, Naegeli"; "On the position of 

 Chantransia, with a description of a new species, by Mr. George 

 Murray and Miss E. Barton" ; Miss A. L. Smith, " On the de- 

 velopment of the cystocarp in Cattophyllis laciniata "; and Mr. J. B. 

 Carruthers, " On the cystocarps of some genera of Florideaj." 



