J OURN AL 



OF THE 



NEW-YORK MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY, 



Vol. VIIL JANUAEY, 1892. No. 1. 



WHAT IS A DIATOM ? 



A LECTURE 

 BY CHARLES F. COX. 



(^Delivered December i8tA, tSgi.) 



A few years ago, one of the newspapers of this city poured 

 forth most biting sarcasm upon the presumably impractical and 

 altogether useless system of education pursued at the College of 

 the City of New York, because upon its annual examination pa- 

 pers there had appeared the question which I have adopted as 

 the title of this lecture. 



Although it is not at all likely that my words will ever reach 

 the editor who put forth this ignorant plea for a shallow utilita- 

 rianism, I have felt, ever since I read his peppery arti*cle, that I 

 should like to harp upon the theme for which he expressed his 

 bitter disdain. Not because the summit of wisdom is attained 

 when one knows what a diatom is, but because I believe that even 

 yet some good may be done by insisting upon the value there is 

 in pure science. The editor with whom I thus take issue, if he 

 ever was a college student, probably acquired his " education " in 

 the days when there was no place in the curriculum for any sci- 

 ence that went below the glittering surface of knowledge. But 

 there has been a great change in recent years. Not only is sci- 

 ence more taught, but more science is taught ; and, along with the: 



