1904-1905-] Address by the President. 235 



you should be one-sided. I have spoken of what may be 

 called the animate side of nature ; there is another side — the 

 inanimate — which I would not wish you to overlook. Here 

 also may be found influences which appeal to our higher 

 feelings. I would not wish your mind to be entirely engrossed 

 with somites and tracheae, with ovaries and chromosomes. 

 Admire the sheen on the elytra of the beetle and the velvety 

 down on the petal of the flower before you subject them to the 

 scalpel. There is beauty in the gentle rivulet winding its 

 silent course through the flowery mead ; there is grandeur in 

 the mountain torrent in its wild leap down the rocky gorge ; 

 and there is sublimity in the raging storm as it hurls the 

 ocean's billows against the cliffs, driving their spray far across 

 the fields. I would not have you miss the glint of the slant- 

 ing sunbeam on the ripple of the brook by your eye being 

 fixed on the bottom in search of a fresh-water mollusc ; nor 

 the glorious suffusion of the glow of light as the foam-covered 

 steeds of Helios, with their fire-engirdled chariot, pass from 

 view beneath the western horizon, because you are peering 

 into a rock-pool looking for a sea-anemone. In all these 

 sights of nature, inanimate though they be, there are influences 

 impelling us on to things higher and better, and I would not 

 wish that you should stop your ears or shut your eyes 

 to them. 



During the year there have been changes in the member- 

 ship of the Society. We have lost several by death and 

 resignations, but there have also been admissions of new 

 members, so that, upon the whole, our numbers have not fallen 

 below those of the previous year. I think you will pardon 

 me if I allude specially to one member who has been removed 

 from us by death — I mean Dr Andrew Semple. His exten- 

 sive knowledge and varied experience, and withal his modest 

 and kindly disposition, endeared him to all who knew him. 

 He was a very constant attender at our indoor meetings, but 

 his age precluded him from taking much part in our excur- 

 sions. He told me, however, that he was looking forward to 

 be able to join in some of them this season, but it was not to 

 be ; the word was spoken — " Eeturn," — and he has gone 

 from us. 



