PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. 287 



Swift, Messrs. R. and J. Beck, and other celebrated makers, who 

 exhibited instruments as perfect as the modern researches of science 

 would permit, and some of the objects shown were very beautiful. 



Taken altogether, the general ojiinion apjjearcd to be that the 

 exhibition of scientific objects was better than that of last year ; and 

 that greater interest is taken in scientific pursuits, owing to the 

 establishment of the Croydon Microscopical Club, was evident from 

 the increasing desire of the visitors to have the objects thoroughly 

 explained to them ; and it is only due to those gentlemen who exhi- 

 bited, to state that they were untiring in their efforts to enlighten 

 every thoughtful and anxious inquirer. 



Microscopical Section of the Liverpool Medical Institution.* 



The first meeting of this, the third session of the above Section, 

 was held on October 20, 1871. 



Mr. Hamilton in the chair, twenty-four members present. 



This Section of the Liver j)ool Medical Society meets once in each 

 month, and the subjects brought under its consideration are medical 

 in character, or relate to medicine. 



At this meeting the chairman urged each member of the Society 

 to assist in prosecuting microscopical research, and added that the 

 Council of the Society have voted a certain sum for that pxirpose, a 

 room was being furnished in which members might work with the 

 microscope and mount specimens. 



Mr. Hamilton then read his paper on " The Identity of Life in its 

 Earliest Manifestations." 



The object of the paper, stated the author, is only tentative, a 

 proposal, as the result of certain experiments to look for the origin of 

 the earliest forms of life as a sequence of the disintegration of a 

 compound life, — in a somewhat diflerent manner than has hitherto been 

 done. It is intended further to illustrate that the decomposition of 

 organic matter, however varied in its kind, shows in the first stages 

 of that decomj)osition similar forms (under the microscope) of rudi- 

 mentary life. There is therefore a stage in the breaking up of all 

 organic structures when they assume identical shapes. 



The author's ex2)eriments consisted of two series. In the first of 

 these, he placed portions of various kinds of animal and vegetable 

 structures severally under conditions favourable for decomposition, 

 and from the decomposition of each form of living thing he saw th; 

 same kind of animalcule spring. In the second class of experiments 

 trial was made of solutions of carbolic acid, suljihurous acid, suljjhate 

 of coi:)per, refined petroleum, chromic acid, and hydrocyanic acid, to 

 prevent decomjiosition, and the author's conclusions C(mcurred witl 

 those arrived at by Dr. Dougal, of Glasgow, and communicated to the 

 last meeting of the British Association. 



Dr. Braidwood next read his paper " On the Adulterations of 

 Coffee, Popper, &c., detectable by the Microscope." 



* Received from Mr. Braidwood, Dec. 27, 1871. 



