( 105 ) 

 PKOCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY. 



Meeting of 11th December, 1878, at King's College, Strand, W.C. 

 Dr. C. T. Hudson, M.A., LL.D., Vice President, in the Chair. 



The Minutes of the meeting of 13th November were read and con- 

 firmed, and were signed by the Chairman. 



The following List of Donations received since the last meeting 

 was submitted, and the thanks of the Society given to the donors. 



From 



Two dozen Slides of Insect Scales Mr. Dmis. 



A Micrometer ruled with Divisions of an Inch and of a IMilli- 



metre Mr. J. Beck. 



A Cabinet for the Society's Instruments and Apparatus . . . . Mr. Frank Crisp. 



Dr. Hudson read a paper (Dr. MiUar having taken the chair pro 

 tern.) on a new species of (Ecistes, sent to him by Mr. Oxley, which 

 he had at first named CE. Sphagni, but now proposed to call by the 

 more descriptive name of CE. umhella, from its peculiar shape, which 

 was shown by coloured drawings (see p. 1). After some remarks as 

 to the nature of Conochilus volvox, which, if it could be turned inside 

 out, would have very much the appearance of a Melicerta, and com- 

 mending the paper by Mr. Davis upon the subject. Dr. Hudson exhi- 

 bited to the meeting some beautiful coloured trausjiareut diagrams, 

 prepared by himself, of Rotatoria, which he showed in the darkened 

 room by means of three duplex lamps placed behind them. The series 

 comprised (Ecistes cry stall iiius, Limnias ceratcplujlli, Limnias annula- 

 tus, Cephalosiphon Limnias, Melicerta ringens, Melicerta tyro (for which 

 the new name of If. Tubicolaria was proposed), Steplianoceros Eichornii, 

 Floscularia campanulata, ConocMlus volvox, Lacinularia socialis, Euch- 

 lanis triquetra, Pterodina patina, Actinurus Neptunius, Notommata aurita, 

 Pedalion miruni, Trochosphcera ceqiiatorialis (from the Philippine 

 Islands), and Nais digitata. The exhibition was accompanied by 

 brief remarks, in the course of which Dr. Hudson observed that he 

 thought that Mr. Bedwell in his excellent pa2)er on ilelicertahad credited 

 that creatiu'e with rather more intelligence than it deserved. Mr. 

 Bedwell had stated that when a particle came down to the mouth, it 

 descended upon a kind of elastic cushion, and he had credited this 

 cushion with a discriminating power such that the moment an object 

 touched it there was an instant decision and disposal of it, and it was 

 taken in or passed to the right or left or rejected according to its 

 nature and fitness for food or building purposes. For his own part, 

 he doubted this explanation of the phenomena, for the reasons men- 

 tioned in his paper. A curious instance was also related of what 

 seemed very like intelligent action on the part of a specimen of 

 Floscidaria campanulata, which, having seized and enveloped an in- 

 fusorion too large and straight to enable it to withdraw within its 



