THE AMERICAN 



MONTHLY 



MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 



YoL. IX. SEPTEMBER, 1888. No. 9. 



The nature of Protozoa and the lessons of these simplest animals, 

 with an account of what has been done in America to elucidate 

 the group.* 



By Prof. D. S. KELLICOTT,t 



BUFFALO, N. Y. 



In accorcUince with well established precedent, and by your kindness, 

 it is my privilege to address you this evening hour of the first day of the 

 annual meeting. In making choice of a theme I have been guided largely by 

 the safe examples of my learned and distinguished predecessors who have ad- 

 dressed you on similar occasions, and who have preferred to discuss topics 

 pertaining to their special fields of research rather than to present a general 

 review of the progress towards the perfection of the microscope and its ac- 

 cessories, or to the mass of varied research with the instrument. The Presi- 

 dent last year, at Pittsburg, in beginning his address, said : — ' Microscopy 

 is more nearly cosmopolitan in its character than any other science. If I did 

 not believe this I should not have consented to occupy this honorable posi- 

 tion which I now hold by your suffrages. I suppose I am indebted to this 

 expression of your confidence on account of the use which I have made of 

 the microscope as an essential factor in a single line of research.' 



Likewise I am pleased to think that I owe my present position, first and 

 partially, to the fact that for six of the ten years of the Society's existence I 

 have been intimately associated with its work as secretary, and second, but 

 may, I hope, chiefly, since in one line of research with the microscope, I have 

 succeeded in bringing to light some forms of minute beings, invisible, indeed, 

 to the unaided eye of man, some of them peculiar and hitherto unknown, 

 whilst others had not been previously announced as occurring in the remark- 

 .ibly varied and interesting microscopic fauna of our native fresh waters. So 

 '": seems to me entirely appropriate that on this occasion I should not go out- 



■''''^le the line of research to which the g^reater number of mv contributions to 



the ^ - _ - ^ . . 



knov 



proceedings have pertained ; moreover, it is the branch in which you 

 •• me best as a naturalist and concerning which I feel some confidence to 

 ^P^'' in your presence. Hence, I shall ask your attention for this hour to a 

 general JjgcysgJQi-, of the nature of Protozoa and lessons of these simplest 

 annna s, fQiiQ-y^g^j ]-,y ^j-, account of what has been done in America to eluci- 

 date t le .p.j.Q^p_ jjij^ before proceeding with this subject permit me to extend 

 somewha^ these preliminary remarks. 



^^ ''lerican Society of Microscopists, like kindred societies everywhere, 

 IS compost ^1 ^£ |-j-,Qgg ^}^Q ygg tiygf microscope in many and widely different 

 )iancies au^ activities; the most useful instrument of investigation yet dis- 



* Annual address ,_,..,-. /• .«. . > .^11 . « 



jggg before the American Society of Microscopists, read at the Columbus meeting, August 21 • 



t Recently elected i , , . - ^ , , ,, . , . , ^, . r- tt ■ 



J the chair of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy in the Ohio State university. 



