172 TRANSACTIONS, NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF GLASGOW. 



a superior in Soutli Africa in shape, beautj^, and size of horn. 

 Thanks to its secluded habits, and to living in the bush and 

 forest, it continues fairly abundant in most districts. Its cork- 

 screw-like horns are of great weight, and attain to 4 feet in a 

 straight line, or 5 feet 3 inches over the curve. The Gemsbok is 

 now almost confined to the Kalahari desert ; seemingly indepen- 

 dent of water, it loves the arid regions of the South-west. The 

 Gemsbok alone, with hardly an exception among the fully twenty- 

 five species of African antelopes, will face the lion, and the 

 carcases of the lion and Gemsbok are occasionally found rotting 

 together on the veldt, the lion having been impaled in its spring, 

 and firmly fixed on the sharp horns of its quarrj'. 



27th February, 1900. 

 ^ Mr. Alex. Somerville, B.Sc, F.L.S., President, in the chair. 



There was so large an attendance that the meeting had to 

 adjourn from the small to the large hall downstairs. 



Mr. Claud A. Allan, 1G3 West George Sti-eet, was elected a 

 Life Member; and Mr. James Williamson, 12 Dover Street, and 

 Dr. J. Wallace Anderson, were elected Ordinary Members of the 

 Society. 



The Chairman then introduced the lecturer of the evening, 

 Mr. William S. Bruce, F.R.S.G.S., as one well qualified to speak 

 upon his subject, " Life in the Polar Regions." In his introduc- 

 tory remarks the lecturer outlined what his Polar voyages had 

 been, stating that his information had been derived from one 

 voyage to the Antarctic in the "Balaena," from two voyages to 

 the Arctic regions with the Prince of Monaco in his splendid 

 yacht the "Princesse Alice," from one voyage with the Jackson- 

 Harmsworth Expedition on the "Windward, "and from two voyages 

 with Mr. Andrew Coats, of Paisley, in the latter's yacht 

 "Blencathra" (now "Pandora"). The series of magnificent lantern 

 slides which were thrown on the sci'een showed aspects of Spitz- 

 bergen and Novaia Zemlya very different from what one usually 

 associates with Polar conditions of life. Instead of stormy seas, 

 the waters were seen to be calm, and in place of absolutely snow- 

 covered and sterile land, there were beautifully-outlined rocky 

 hills carpeted with a low vegetation, and even up to the height 



