22 PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 
another, but may join them in bowing as a merely accidental atti- 
tude. Messrs. E. FarquHar and Mussry spoké of the antiquity 
of kissing as indicated by Hebrew and Greek literature. Other 
remarks were made by the President and by Mr. CLARKE. 
Mr. R. D. Mussey made a communication entitled 
WHEN I FIRST SAW THE CHOLERA BACILLUS. 
286TH MEETING. APRIL 24, 1886. 
The President in the Chair. 
Thirty members present. 
The President communicated an invitation from the American 
Historical Association to attend its sessions of April 27-29. 
Mr. G. Brown Goope and Mr. T. H. Bean made a joint com- 
munication on 
THE DISTRIBUTION OF FISHES IN THE OCEANIC ABYSSES AND 
MIDDLE STRATA. 
Remarks were made by Messrs. Paut, Harkness, BILurnes, 
DoouitrLeE, GooprE, WELLING, and Taytor, and by Prof. 
Epwarp D. Cops, of Philadelphia. 
Mr. GILBERT THOMPSON made a communication on 
THE PHYSICAL-GEOGRAPHICAL DIVISIONS OF THE SOUTHEASTERN 
PORTION OF THE UNITED STATES AND THEIR CORRESPONDING 
TOPOGRAPHICAL TYPES, 
[Abstract. ] 
Having charge of the geographical work carried on by the U. S. 
Geological Survey in that portion of the Appalachian region south 
of Pennsylvania and the Ohio river, I have had occasion to con- 
sider the classification of the region from the point of view of the 
geographer. It has previously been divided by many authors and 
into numerous sections, the basis of classification being geological 
botanical, agricultural, or commercial, and usually from a local 
standpoint. For my purposes the principal basis of classification 
is the character of the topographic relief, but this is so closely 
