42 Presidential Address. 



the attractions of the females ; the males and their young being 

 left not at all, or but little modified."'' I will conclude by again 

 quoting from Professor Geddes and Thomson's book. They 

 state therein : — " Few maintain that the sexes are essentially 

 equal, still fewer that the females excel; the general bias of 

 authority has been in favour of the males. From the earliest 

 ages philosophers have contended that woman is but an unde- 

 iveloped man. Darwin's theory of sexual selection pre-supposes 

 a superiority and an entail in the male line : for Spencer, the 

 development of woman is early arrested by procreative functions. 

 In short, Darwin's man is, as it were, an evolved woman, and 

 Spencer's woman an arrested man."^ Can this statement be 

 applied to male and female birds? How is it that in certain 

 species of birds the male should be inferior to the female in size 

 or in plumage, or undertakes, wholly or in part, the duties of 

 incubation? I see here a problem which is worthy of the con- 

 sideration of the students of the origin of sex. 



References. 



1 " Origin of Species." Charles Darwin. Third Edition. 1861. 



2 " British Birds Magazine," Vol. III., pp. 155, 156. • 



3 " Manual of British Birds." Howard Saunders. 1899. 



4 "Dictionary of Birds." A. Newton. 1893-96. 



5 " Ibis." Vol. III. (N.S.) 1867. p. 414. 



6 " The Evolution of Sex." Professor Patrick GeJdes and J. 



Arthur Thomson. 1901. 



7 " Descent of Man." Charles Darwin. 1901. 



8 " Sexual Dimorphism in the Animal Kingdom." By J. T. 



Cunningham. 1900. 



9 " An Example of True Hermaphroditism in the Domestic Fowl, 



with Remarks on the Phenomena of Allopterotism." By S. 

 G. Shattock and C. G. Seligmann. Trans. Pathological 

 Society of London. Vol. 57, Part 1. 1906. 



10 " Footsteps in Natural History." 1836. 



17th December, 1909. 



Chairman— Dr J. W. Martin, V.P. 



The Report of the Photographic Sub-Committee, embodying 

 the proposals that the work of the Photographic Association 



