6 REPORT — 1900. 



It is not my intention, even if I possessed the requisite knowledge, 

 to undertake so arduous a task as to review the progress which has recently 

 been made in the great body of sciences which lie within the domain of 

 the British Association. As my occupation in life has required me to 

 give attention to the science which deals with the structure and organisa- 

 tion of the bodies of man and animals — a science which either includes 

 within its scope or has intimate and widespread relations to comparative 

 anatomy, embryology, morphology, zoology, physiology, and anthropology 

 — I shall limit myself to the attempt to bring before you some of the more 

 important observations and conclusions which have a bearing on the 

 present position of the subject. As this is the closing year of the century, 

 it will not, I think, be out of place to refer to the changes which a 

 hundred years have brought about in our fundamental conceptions of the 

 structure of animals. In science, as in business, it is well from time to 

 time to take stock of what we have been doing, so that we may realise 

 where we stand and ascertain the balance to our credit in the scientific 

 ledger. 



So far back as the time of the ancient Greeks it was known that the 

 human body and those of the more highly organised animals were not homo- 

 geneous, but were built up of parts, the partes dissimilares (ra ayofiom ^eprj) 

 of Aristotle, which difiered from each other in form, colour, texture, 

 consistency, and properties. These parts were familiarly known as the 

 bones, muscles, sinews, blood-vessels, glands, brain, nerves, and so on. 

 As the centuries rolled on, and as observers and observations multiplied, 

 a more and more precise knowledge of these parts throughout the Animal 

 Kingdom was obtained, and various attempts were made to classify 

 animals in accordance with their forms and structure. During the 

 concluding years of the last century and the earlier part of the present, 

 the Hunters, William and John, in our country, the Meckels in Germany, 

 Cuvier and Saint-Hilaire in France, gave an enormous impetus to anatomical 

 studies, and contributed largely to our knowledge of the construction of the 

 bodies of animals. But whilst by these and other observers the most 

 salient and, if I may use the expression, the grosser characters of animal 

 organisation had been recognised, little was known of the more intimate 

 structure or texture of the parts. So far as could be determined by the 

 unassisted vision, and so much as could be recognised by the use of a 

 simple lens, had indeed been ascertained, and it was known that muscles, 

 nerves, and tendons were composed of threads or fibres, that the blood- 

 and lymph-vessels were tubes, that the parts which we call fasciae and 

 aponeui'oses were thin membranes, and so on. 



Early in the present century Xavier Bichat, one of the most brilliant 

 men of science during the Napoleonic era in France, pubUshed his 

 ' Anatomie Gi^n^rale,' in which he formulated important general principles. 

 Every animal is an assemblage of different organs, each of which dis- 

 charges a function, and acting together, each in its own way, assists in the 



