( xc ) 



anniversary of the appearance of the "Origin," is a worthy 

 memorial of the three great Darwin commemorations which 

 have lately claimed so much of our attention, and with which 

 the name of our former President, Alfred Russel Wallace, 

 still happily on our list of existing Fellows, is inseparably 

 connected. 



Of treatises published abroad, I may perhaps mention Karl 

 Fiebrig's careful investigation of the su^ijjosed symbiosis of 

 trees and ants, to be fovmd in the Leipzig Biologisches 

 Centralhlatt ; and Meisenheimer's very remarkable experiments 

 on secondary sexual characters in Lepidoptera, recorded in his 

 Experimentelle Studien published by Fischer in Jena. 



The past year has been rich in events interesting to all 

 Entomologists. A departure of great importance has been 

 taken by the Colonial Office in the constitution of a Committee 

 for Entomological Research, on which body several of our 

 most distinguished Fellows are serving, and in connection with 

 which responsible posts are held by Mr. G. A. K. Marshall and 

 Mr. S. A. Neave. Under such auspices tlie enterprise cannot 

 fail to accomplish work of the highest value. In view of the 

 peculiar significance of this undertaking, I shall ask to be 

 allowed to quote some words used elsewhere by me in reference 

 to it : — 



"The announcement of the appointment of this Committee 

 will be received with much satisfaction in all quarters where 

 the importance of a scientific basis for administrative and 

 other official action is duly recognised. Among the advances 

 of biological science in the last few years, none has been more 

 remarkable than the discovery that the cause of many 

 diseases whose nature and origin had hitherto escaped detec- 

 tion, was to be sought in the presence of parasitic micro- 

 organisms of various kinds and qualities in the tissues of 

 animals and plants. The part played by insects and ticks in 

 the dissemination of these morbific parasites is now known to 

 be of immense importance, and great eilorts have already been 

 made, not without success, to restrict the occurrence of malarial 

 and other disorders by the systematic destruction of the 

 insect-carriers of the organisms concerned. For this purpose 

 it is essential to distinguish with accuracy between various 

 closely-allied species ; and it is here that the work of the 



