20 PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



most characteristic feature. It was here that the theory of evolu- 

 tion was first given to the world : why should not this be also 

 the birthplace of the epoch-making biological theories of the 

 future ? 



Whilst the review of the Session affords ground for satisfaction 

 and for hope, it is by no means devoid of matter for regret. A 

 year ago I expressed the wish that Professor Howes might soon be 

 restored to his useful and indefatigable activity amongst lis ; and 

 in that anticipation we i-e-elected him Zoological Secretary. As 

 we all know, to our sorrow, that anticipation has not been fulfilled. 

 At an early period in the Session it became necessary for him to 

 resign his" office, which was filled by the election of the Rev. 

 T. 11. E. Stebbiug, to whom it is impossible to give higher praise 

 than to say that he is emulating the example of his distinguished 

 predecessor. On the occasion of his resignation, the Council 

 transmitted to Prof. Howes a vote of sympathy and of appreciation 

 of his valuable services to the Society, a proceeding that must, I 

 am sm-e, meet with the heartfelt approval of this meeting. 



Our other losses include several valued Fellows, among whom I 

 may specially mention Dr. William Francis, for seven years an 

 Associate and for sixty years a Fellow of the Society, who had 

 long been a member of the well-known firm to whom we entrust 

 the printing of our publications ; Isaac Cooke Thompson, the 

 well-known naturalist of Liverpool, who had been Secretary and 

 President of the Liverpool Microscopical Society, and was one of 

 the founders of the Liverpool Biological Society, in connection with 

 which he accomplished most of the scientitic work of his later 

 years, devoting himself more especially to certain groups of 

 Crustacea ; and Sir Walter Sendall, G.C.M.G., who, in his time, 

 had been Grovernor of the Windward Islands, of Barbados, and of 

 British Guiana, as well as High Commissioner for Cyprus, and 

 whose death has an especially mournful interest for me in that he 

 was a distinguished member of Christ's College, my own old 

 Cambridge home, where his name was, and will remain, a household 

 word. 



We have to deplore the loss, among our Foreign Members, of 

 two eminent biologists : — Dr. Carl Gegenbaur, Professor of Com- 

 parative Anatomy in the University of Heidelberg ; and Dr. Michael 

 Woronin, of St. Petersburg. 



Carl Gegenbaur, one of the most distinguished pupils of 

 Johannes Midler, leaves behind him a record of fifty years' scientific 

 work of the highest character. Some of his earlier years were 

 given up to the study of Invertebrates, but after 1860 he devoted 

 himself entirely to the investigation of the Comparative Anatomy 

 of Vertebrates. Among his many important discoveries in this 

 department of Zoology, perhaps the most fertile was that of the 

 relation between certain of the cranial nerves and the branchial 

 skeleton. An inspiring teacher, as well as a profound researcher, 

 he exercised an exceptional influence upon the development of his 

 subject. It is not too much to say that the present position of 



