1892.] MICllOSCOFICAL JOURNAL. 23 



Stark was authorized to exchange duplicate mounts. The Society will 

 meet on the first Tuesday of each month in 1892, at the College of Phar- 

 macy. The officers elected were as follows : 



President, Dr. J. C. Falk ; Vice-President, T. A. Buckland ; Treas- 

 *urer. Dr. H. M. Whelpley ; Secretary, S. E. Barber ; Curator, William 

 Elhardt. 



Montreal Microscopical Society. 



Nov. g, i8gi. — At the annual meeting, J. Stevenson Brown, Esq., 

 delivered the presidential address on "The Duty of Science," and was 

 re-elected President. Leslie J. Skelton was elected Hon. Secretary ; 

 J. S. Shearer, Hon. Treasurer. 



The membership has trebled during the year, although persons " must 

 be possessed of an achromatic microscope " to qualify them for election. 

 The Society is free from debt, and all dues from members were reported 

 paid. The meetings are held in the library of the Natural History 

 Society on the second Monday of each month. 



Among the papers presented at previous meetings of the year were : 

 " Illumination as Applied to the Microscope," by the President ; " Facts 

 Connected with Keeping an Aquarium," by Dean Carmichael ; " Hints 

 on the Microtome," by W. G. Johnson, M. D. ; " Histology of the 

 Eye of the Owl and Lobster," by J. W. Stirling, M. D. ; " The Mi- 

 croscope and Bacteriology," by J. A. Beaudry, M. D. ; " The Polari- 

 scope as Applied to the Separation of Starches," by G. P. Girdwood, 

 M.^D. ; " The Bacteria in Montreal Drinking Water," by W. G. John- 

 son, M. D. ; " The Bacillus of Diphtheria," by J. B. McConnell, M. D. 



Dec. 14. /(?p/.— Sir William Dawson, LL. D., President of McGill 

 College, read a paper on '' The Use of the Microscope in the Study of 

 Fossils." 



The lecture was most interesting owing to the fact that Sir Wm. not 

 only gave in clear, concise terms the accumulated results of years of 

 continuous i^esearch, but also demonstrated at the same time some of 

 the difficulties that the early investigators had to contend with, owing 

 to the poor instruments at their command. The lecturer exhibited his 

 first microscope, of date 1S34, which, on comparison, proved much 

 inferior to those now in use. Nothing could mark more clearly the 

 optical advance, made to meet the increasing demands of science, than 

 a comparison between this instrument and that of to-day. 



Attention was directed to a number of the foraminifera of the lower 

 St. Lawrence and a. comparison drawn between these and those from 

 other sections. A sample of clay taken from the excavations made for 

 the new Experimental Physics building, in McGill College grounds, 

 was shown to be largely composed of foraminiferous matter. The 

 ordinary limestone of which the city of Montreal is so largely built was 

 demonstrated as owing its origin to these minute organisms, which 

 had lived, built for posterity, and perished ages ago. 



Sponges and corals were also treated of at some length and their 

 formation and structure explained. 



At one time the coal formations of Cape Breton, N. S., had been 

 studied by Sir William, and some very interesting results were submit- 

 ted to the meeting and compared with observations elsewhere. 



The lecture was illustrated throughout with slides, fossils, rock sec- 



