18 



If I mistake not, Ruskin in one of his wayward moods 

 declared that what could not be seen with healthy unaided 

 sight was not meant to be reen at all ! But no wise man could 

 be guilty of a more unwarranted assertion. Be it under 2 inch 

 objective or under l-15th inch oil immersion objective, a revela- 

 tion of hitherto unseen wonders is made manifest. It is 

 amusing to experienced students to observe the faces and listen 

 to the exclamations of man or woman who watches, for instance, 

 the movements of Melicerta riugeus, or the graceful action of 

 Lophopus Crystallinus. Equally delightful to a)iy student, 

 even the most " hardened " in these investigations, is the 

 streaming of protoplasm in Tradescnntia or Annchnris. No 

 surprise then need be experienced at work so detached from 

 the routine of commercial life, affording, not alone rest of brain, 

 but absolute fitness for the sterner and more prosaic duties that 

 call for our attention day by day.* 



My words are addressed to those who participate in no 

 small degree in the phase of studious pleasure I have just 

 referred to. We know of one gentleman who has devoted 

 so much time to the Radiolaria that he is gradually 

 submerging himself in micro-slides. Another is, hyberbolically 

 speaking, already " lost to sight" in the preparation of Conifer 

 sections, to say nothing of other branches of biological study, 

 that send some of us into a condition of despair. A third 

 devotes all his spare time to the Dlatomacu: and the production 

 of marvellous photo-micrographs. And yet these three cases 

 are not alone actual in their existence, but typical, too, of 

 many gentlemen (I may safely say thousands throughout 

 Great Britain and Ireland) who are first and foremost 

 commercial men, and students afterwards. Should you care 

 to question any of them as to the utility or otherwise of their 

 studies they will quickly respond that the study of science 

 has been to them a source of unending joy and mental 

 refreshment. 



Nor should we, in speaking of science, be forgetful of 

 departments other than those already referred to. Take, 



* "A fellow and his business should be bosom friends iit the office and sworn 

 enemies o(// of it," — George Horace Lorimer. 



