1883.] 



MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 



65 



The President, Mr. B. Bianiar,, 

 who has been reelected for the 

 present year, delivered the following 

 short address, after which the folding 

 doors were thrown open and the au- 

 dience passed into the exhibition- 

 room, where forty-eight objects were 

 shown on sixteen round tables, under 

 as many microscopes. 



The President spoke as follows : — 



Ladies and Gentlemen : — Your at- 

 tention is invited to a few thoughts on 

 The Usefulness of the Microscope as 

 an Instrument of Recreation. 



Of recreations, those are the best 

 which serve at once for diversion, for 

 enthusiasm, for benevolence, for edu- 

 cation. In the hands of a thoughtful 

 man, few, if any, instrumentalities of 

 recreation possess and unite these at- 

 tributes in larger completeness and 

 fuller harmony than does the employ- 

 ment of the microscope. It adapts 

 itself to the tired mind's uncertain 

 and imperious moods with sympathe- 

 tic readiness and versatility. It com- 

 mands the quickening quality of 

 enthusiasm, and the sweet virtue 

 of a frequent kindly thought of the 

 happiness of other persons. At the 

 same time it liberally informs the 

 uiKierstanding and spurs the imagina- 

 tion. 



I. It serves for diversion. The char- 

 acteristic of a good diversion is that 

 in a rational and pleasant way it lures 

 a man into forgetfulness of his perish- 

 able goods, his business perplexities, 

 and the sometimes harassing posses- 

 sion which he calls self. Let the man 

 who is thus burdened take his micro- 

 scope from its polished case, or from 

 under its glass shade, and some pet 

 microscopic objects from his cabinet, 

 and in a moment he is borne away to 

 the bank of the cool stream which 

 yielded to him his elegant Meridian 

 Circulare ; or to sunny Brazil, where 

 his Diamond-beetle arrayed itself 

 right royally with emerald and opal. 

 Or fr.)m his aquarium he selects a leaf 

 of Vanis?i2ria ; and while the neat 

 outlines of the rotating chlorophyll- 



granules make him proud of the defi- 

 nition of his lens, he suddenly finds 

 himself in his boat again on the for- 

 est-bordered lake beneath whose bright 

 waters and on whose sandy bed the 

 Vallisneria grew. Or, if he would as an 

 artist have become a colorist, he reen- 

 forces his microscope with a polari- 

 scope, focusses his objective upon an 

 evaporating solution of potassium 

 chlorate, or upon the cuticle of the 

 scouring-rush, and regales his eye 

 with the witchery of crystal-building, 

 or of ever-varying chromatic effects. 



What the prince of dramatists said 

 of the celebrated Grceco-Egyptian 

 queen, 



" Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale 

 Her infinite variety, " 



may with ten-fold emphasis be af- 

 firmed of the resources of diversion 

 which the microscope places under 

 the control of its master. 



Unlike many other instruments of 

 recreation, the microscope can exert 

 its beguilements daily; and daily 

 diversion is as important as daily 

 work in procuring and preserving 

 that joy of life, a sound mind in a 

 sound body. 



2. Microscopical recreation pos- 

 sesses the virtue of enthusiasm. En- 

 thusiasm is as necessary to success in 

 a man's recreations as it is to prosper- 

 ity in his business pursuits. Some 

 persons, unversed in the ways and ex- 

 periences of amateur microscopists, 

 may conceive microscopy to be a dull 

 and solitary rather than a zestful and 

 social divertisement. Let such stand 

 as spectators where two or more of 

 these modern Knights of the Round 

 Table are engaged in joust or tourney 

 — with their good stands in place of 

 fiery steeds, and with theii fine ocu- 

 lars and objectives in place of tough 

 lance and trusty sword. All the re- 

 sources of a carefully trained intelli- 

 gence and dexterity they will there see 

 applied to ihe handling of mirror and 

 condenser and diaphragm, for the de- 

 fining of some obscure structural fea- 

 ture, or for the resolution of some in- 



