( 39 ) 

 PEOCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES.* 



EOYAL MiCEOSCOPICAL SoCIETY. 



King's College, December 14, 1870. 



Dr. Millar in the chair. 



The minutes of the preceding meeting were read and confirmed. 



The decease of the President of the Society, the Eev. Joseph Ban- 

 croft Keade, M.A., F.R.S., was then announced to the Fellows present 

 by Dr. Millar, in the following terms : — 



It is my painful duty to inform you that our President is no more. 

 In February last he first complained of illness, which gradually in- 

 creased in severity so that it was with difficulty he presided at the 

 last meeting of the session in May ; it was then his friend Dr. 

 Eichardson examined him, and pronounced him to be suffering from 

 incipient cancer, in a place which forbad all hope of removal by 

 operation. From this time his downward course has been very 

 marked ; he gradually but steadily lost flesh — did not suffer so much 

 pain as I expected, and calmly sank without a struggle on the morning 

 of the 12th. 



I last saw him alive on Tuesday, the 7th, when I spent several 

 hoiu'S with him receiving instructions with reference to various matters. 

 He was then very much changed, and it was clear his days were draw- 

 ing to a close ; he spoke to me in the most calm, clear, and collected 

 manner, and referred to his approaching end with the utmost tran- 

 quillity. He took an interest in our Society to the last, spoke of the 

 changes likely to be made, and requested me to present in his name 

 a microscope which is an exact counterpart of his first one made by 

 Dolland, and presented to him by his father when he was 15 years olcl. 

 With it there is the highest power ^jyth made by Dolland at that 

 time, which he had preserved ; these are interesting in the history of 

 the microscope as landmarks of its progress. 



I have also to present six slides, mounted in brass by Cuthbert, of 

 Bat and Mouse hair, Podura, Lejnsrna and Brassica scales, together 

 with a piece of sphagnum ; these are quite curiosities in their way ; 

 they should have accompanied the Objectives he gave to the Society 

 when I presented the Amici microscope some time ago, but they could 

 not at the time be found, and it was only on this day week Mr. Lee 

 found them in sorting some of his apparatus for him. 



I do not know that this is the place for me to refer to it, but I 

 desire to add that a more calm, contented, and happy frame of mind 

 than he was in it is impossible for me to conceive, and I can only 

 wish that my last end may be like his. He will be buried on Friday, 

 at two o'clock. 



Dr. Millar then moved, and J. W. Stephenson, Esq., seconded, that 

 this Society learns with the deepest regret the loss it has sustained 



* Secretaries of Societies will greatly oblige us by writing their reports legibly 

 — especially by printing the technical terms thus : H y d r a — and by " underlining " 

 words, such as specific names, which must be printed in italics. They will thus 

 secure accuracy and enhance the value of their proceedings. — Ed. M. M. J. 



