ADDRESS 



DELIVERED BEFORE THE MEMBERS 



OF THE 



WEST KENT NATURAL HISTORY, MICROSCOPICAL, 

 AND PHOTOGRAPHIC SOCIETY, 



BY 



The President, W. G. LEMON, Esq., B.A., LL.B., F.G.S. 



ON THE 23rd FEBRUARY, 1881. 



Gentlemen, 



The Report presented to you this evening by the Council 

 deals so concisely, and so fully mth the work done by the Society 

 during the past year, that nothing remains to be added by me to 

 the particulars thus laid before you. I am deeply conscious of the 

 honour conferred upon me by electing me your President ; and 

 when I call to mind the illustrious scientific workers who have 

 preceded me in this chair, I know that the oflfice is accorded me, 

 rather by your indulgent kindness and goodwill, than on account of 

 any merit of my own. 



The year has not been without signal advances, we may say 

 triumphs, in almost every department of science. Explorations in 

 Thibet, in Africa, and the ice-bound polar regions — manifold im- 

 provements in mechanics, metallurgy, and electrical science — geo- 

 logical investigations in our own County (especially those of Mr. 

 Flaxman C. J. Spurrell, a worthy son of one of our most honoured 

 members, and himself a member, I may say an alumnus, of this 

 Society) ; all claim attention. But when the history of 1880 is 

 written, it will be found that " Light " has occupied very much 

 of the time and thought of scientific observers. 



The connection of light with heat, and with some forms of 

 chemical action, has been long admitted as a fact, and some of its 

 influences on living organisms have been carefully noted. By the 

 scientific progress of recent years the question is forced into promi- 

 nence, "What is the relaticm between light and electricity?" We 

 recognize in light a form of energy or force, but of its intimate 

 nature we know scarcely anything. We speak of it as the dis- 

 turbance of some medium, such disturbance being periodic, both 



