lIKNBAIf SOCIETY OF LONDON. 21 



parage, it \\ould be the relatively small attendance at our meetings. 

 This is, I believe, to be mainly accounted for by the prevailing 

 tendency to regard Societies like our own rather as convenient 

 mechanisms for the publication of papers, than as a means of 

 associating with others interested in similar pursuits. Undoubtedly 

 the publication of papers is a very important — and, I may add, a 

 very costly — function ; but it would be fatal were the Society to 

 be regarded exclusively from this point of view. It is, I fear, 

 sometimes forgotten that l^ellows owe to the Societies to which 

 they belong something more than their annual subscription. In 

 our own case, each Fellow on election declares that '"he will 

 endeavour to promote the good of the Society, will pursue the 

 ends for which the same was instituted, and will be present at the 

 meetings as often as conveniently he can." A more general 

 realization of this pledge of personal service would, I am convinced, 

 rejuvenate our Society : the interest of its meetings would be 

 greatly increased and its usefulness extended, making it, as it 

 ought to be, the centre of biological activity in this country. 



It cannot be urged that the subjects discussed during the present 

 session have not been sufficiently varied and attractive, for they 

 have ranged over a wide area and have not infrequently been of 

 first-rate importance. Systematic Zoology is represented by such 

 papers as that of Mr. Chapman on the Foramiuifera of the 

 Funafuti Atoll ; that of Messrs. Walker and Scott on Malacostraca 

 from the Eed Sea, collected by Dr. H. 0. Forbes ; of Prof. Gravel 

 (Bordeaux) on some new species of Cirripedia in the ^STatural 

 History Collection of tlie British Museum ; and of Mr. Gr. M. 

 Thomson on the Xew Zealand Phyllobrauchiate Crustacea-Macrura. 

 The economic side of Zoology is touched upon by the paper of 

 Mr. Warburton and Miss Embleton on the Life-history of the 

 Black-Currant Gall-Mite, a pest to fruit-growers. Dr. Andrews 

 gave us a most interesting account of the fossil Vertebrates, some 

 of which are primitive Proboscidians, that have been found in the 

 Miocene and Eocene of Egypt. The most scientifically important 

 of the zoological papers are probably those of Dr. Elliot Smith, of 

 Cairo, on tlie Morphology of the Brain in Mammalia, with special 

 reference to the Lemurs hoth living and extinct ; and that of 

 Dr. E. Broom on the Early Condition of the Shoulder- Girdle in 

 the Polyprotodont Marsupials Dasi/urus and Perameles. 



Systematic Botany is well represented by the papers of Messrs. 

 Hemsley and Pearson on the Flora of Tibet ; of Mr. Spencer Le 

 Marchaut Moore on the Composite Flora of Africa ; and of 

 Mr. Cheeseman on the Flora of Earotonga. Dr. Stapf has 

 recorded the discovery of an exalbuminous Grass, Melocnnna 

 hamhusoides, Trin. The rising science of Palieophytology has 

 asserted itself in the papers of Dr. Scott on the Botrj^opterideae, 

 an extinct family of Ferns ; of Prof. "Weiss on Le^ndopliloios 

 fidifjinosus ; and of Mr. Seward and Miss Ford on the Anatomy 

 of Todea and the affinity and geological history of the Osmundacese. 

 Nor has Physiology been neglected ; for Mr. F. Darwin gave us an 



