gest =) 
promise. The time which we give to Societies such as this— 
time we are sometimes apt to grudge—is well spent. Here, 
and in kindred communities, a ‘‘man sharpeneth the counten- 
ance of his friend,” and there is born of the influence of mind 
upon mind thought which is not a mere resultant of diverse 
forces, but a new creation. 
The scientific man who shuts himself away from his fellow- 
men, in the belief that he is thereby obtaining conditions the 
most favourable for research, is grievously mistaken. Man, 
scientific man perhaps more inevitably than others, is a social 
animal, and the contrast between the lives of Darwin and 
Burchell shows us that friendly sympathy with our brother 
naturalists is an essential element in successful and continued 
investigation. 
I do not suppose that it is necessary to justify a discussion 
of the term “species” as the subject of the Anniversary 
Address to the Entomological Society of London, The students 
of insect form and function hold an exalted place among 
naturalists. The material of their researches enables them, 
almost compels them, to take the keenest and most active 
interest in broad questions affecting the history and course of 
life on our planet. Naturalists engaged upon other groups 
may reasonably inquire why insects, above all other animals, 
should be so especially valuable for the elucidation of the 
larger problems which deal, not only with the species of a 
single group, but with every one of the innumerable and 
infinitely varied forms, vegetable no less than animal, in 
which life manifests itself. The answer is to be found in the 
large number of offspring produced by each pair of insects, 
and the rapidity with which the generations succeed each 
other, many cycles being completed in a single year in warm 
countries; in the severity of the struggle for life which 
prevents this remarkable rate of multiplication from becom- 
ing the cause of any progressive increase in the number of 
individuals; and finally, in the character of the struggle 
itself, which is precisely of that highly specialised kind 
between the keen senses and activities of enemies, and the 
means of concealment or other modes of defence of their 
insect prey, which leads, by action and answering reaction, to 
