1. PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 



commenced an epoch in the history of the scientific investigation 

 of the Coelenterata. This work, pre-eminent among the Mono- 

 graphs of the Ray Society, came as a revelation to the zoologists 

 at the time. In 1854 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal 

 Society, and in 1873 received the Royal Society's Royal Medal. 

 In 1877 he was awarded the Brisbane Gold Medal of the Royal 

 Society of Edinburgh, and in 1878 the Cunningham Gold Medal 

 of the Royal Irish Academy, while in 1896 he received the Gold 

 Medal of the Linnaean Society he had served so well. On his 

 retirement into private life he settled in this county, at Parkstone, 

 where his genial friend, Dr. Alfred Russel Wallace, also lives, who 

 I hope wilKbe elected by the members as his successor to the 

 vacancy Dr. Allman's death has made in the list of our Honorary 

 Members, which has been hitherto filled by eminent scientific men. 

 Life is a mystery, we can mark its manifestations, but we can 

 never trace its source. We observe that an animal or plant lives, 

 but we cannot tell what keeps the blood or the sap coursing 

 through the veins of the one and the tissues of the other without 

 a "pause. We are able to read the poet's lines and look at the 

 artist's pictures and hear the musician's songs, but we know 

 nothing of the inner mental life that produced the poem, the 

 pictures, and the songs. It is a hidden life. Since its first 

 introduction on the globe, life has gone on advancing, diversify- 

 ing and rising to higher and higher levels. This progress and 

 change have been unceasing and gradual, though not at a 

 uniform rate. New forms of plants and animals originated in 

 some area, and spread in all directions until stopped by some 

 obstacle of climate, or of topography, which they were unable to 

 surmount. The diffusion of new forms often occasioned the 

 extinction of the old which were not so welt fitted for survival. 

 Ancient types may have occasionally lingered in certain localities 

 long after they had elsewhere become extinct. The remarkable 

 climatal changes through which various parts of the earth have 

 passed are indicated by fossils. With the exception of glacial 

 marks and ice -formed deposits they offer the most trustworthy 

 evidence available as to changes of climate. Thus when we find 



