32 PROCEEDINGS OV THE 



individual, or rather one of its arms : it contains, moreover, a good 

 deal of Newport's best work. Volume sxi. (1855) is full of inter- 

 esting zoological papers by Westwood, Newport, Yarrell, Gosse, and 

 b}' the President, Bell, who here publishes the first part of his 

 ' Horaj Carcinologicse.' It is rather remarkable that, under these 

 circumstances, we should find President Bell deploring, in his 

 " Anniversarj' Address " for 1857, ' the obvious declension of our 

 zoological element,' and complaining of ' the deficiency in the 

 number and importance of the zoological papers communicated to 

 the Society.' To a layman, like myself, this jeremiad seems to have 

 been quite uncalled for. It would appear, on the contrary, that 

 the zoological work of the Society was showing increasing vitalitj', 

 inasmuch as new and singularly competent contributors Avere coming 

 to the front. For instance, the second volume of the " Proceedings" 

 (1848-55) contains, among other interesting contributions, two by 

 Huxley (with the initial W !) on Pliysalia and on the Anatomy of 

 Diphyes; and the second volumeof the " Journal"(1857-58) includes 

 papers of such importance as that by Dr. Sclater ' On the general 

 Geographical Distribution of the Class Aves,' which is a fundamental 

 document of the subject in that it defines the great zoogeographical 

 provinces, — and that by Owen, ' On the Characters, Principles of 

 Division, and Primary Groups of the Class Mammalia,' containing 

 those statements as to the anatomical peculiarities of the human 

 brain (afterwards repeated in his Eede Lecture at Cambridge, 1859), 

 which gave rise to a spirited passage of arms between him and 

 Huxley, much to the advantage of the latter. The succeeding 

 volume of the "Journal" (iii. 1859) is memorable, not only for the 

 communications by Darwin and by Wallace relative to the origin 

 of species, to which I have already referred, but also for Huxley's 

 account of the ' Anatomy of Nautilus Fompilius,^ the accuracy of 

 which has been tested and not invalidated by recent research. 

 Moreover, in the " Transactions " for the same year (xxii. 1859) 

 appeared Huxley's acute investigations on the ' Agamic Eepro- 

 duction and Morphology of Aphis,'' as well as Owen's description of 

 Euplectella Cucumer. Papers of importance succeed each other so 

 rapidly that it is hardly possible to do more than mention some of 

 them : for example, Huxley, on the Anatomy and Development of 

 Pyrosoma (Trans, xxiii. 1862); Dr. Wallace, on the Zoological 

 Geography of the Malay Archipelago, in which Sclater's views are 

 confirmed (Journ. iv. 1860) ; the first part of Lord Avebury's great 

 monograph of the Thysanura (Trans, xxiii, 1862), which was com- 

 pleted some years later (Trans, xxvii. 1871) ; Bates, on the ' Insect 

 Fauna of the Amazon Valley,' in which the theory of ' Batesian 

 Mimicry ' is propounded (Trans, xxiii. 1862) ; Dr. Wallace, ' On 

 the Phenomena of Variation and Distribution as illustrated by the 

 Papilionidse of the Malayan Region' (Trans, xxv. 1866); Dr. 

 Bastian's ' Monograph of the Anguillulidae ' (Trans, xxv. 1866) ; 

 Mr. Poland Trimen, on ' Mimetic Analogies among African Butter- 

 flies' (Trans, xxvi. 1870), and Brady's 'Monograph of recent British 

 Ostracoda,' as also Prof. Lankester on ' The Lower Annelids,' 



