88 report— 1877. 



.s 



More especially is this true of that corner of the scientific vineyard which it it 

 the business of this department to cultivate, the two sciences of Anatomy and 

 Physiology, of which it is not enough to say that they have made enormous ad- 

 vances, for they have become remodelled in almost every respect. Then the busi- 

 ness of this department was supposed to be purely medical, as can be seen from 

 the record of the sectional proceedings at that meeting, when the subjects considered 

 were such as scald head, opium, squinting, and dropsy. From these narrow limits 

 we are now emancipated ; Anatomy, in its true scientific sense of Animal Morphology, 

 and a truly scientific Physiology have now become no mere adjuncts to a profes- 

 sional education, but have won for themselves a very prominent place among in- 

 dependent sciences. 



This year the department of Anatomy and Physiology meets under singularly 

 favourable auspices. Our sciences have had the honour of supplying a President, 

 one peculiarly our own, to the entire collective body of the British Association ; 

 and as in the animal body the special characters of the head impress themselves 

 throughout the whole extent of the organism, so in our own body corporate we are 

 naturally to expect that an Anatomical President will give to the Department of 

 Anatomy and Physiology the stimulus of an increased and vigorous vitality. 



Owing to the rapidly increasing general interest in Biological Science and to the 

 increased facilities for research, every year adds largely to our stock of facts, so 

 largely, indeed, in point of detail, that a single year's advances in knowledge suffice 

 to fill more than one portly volume. In two directions especially has our know- 

 ledge progressed — in pure Physiology/,where it trenches on the domain of Physical 

 Science, and in Embryology. 



As in the science of Sociology, for the right understanding of any institution, our 

 most philosophical method of study consists in an examination of the conditions 

 which led to its origin and of the influences under which such an institution has 

 grown up, so in our efforts after the comprehension of the organology of the living 

 body, we can only hope for an adequate understanding of the nature of its compo- 

 nent parts by a parallel course of study, an examination of the first appearance of 

 the organ and of its primitive nature, together with a view of the external condi- 

 tions which acted on it, inducing internal reactions and consequent alterations with- 

 out. It is along the lines of this method of research that the largest amount of 

 progress has been made in Morphology during the past few years ; and in this direc- 

 tion the most rapid future advances may be expected. Each animal attains unto 

 its adult condition by a devious course of growth , which here and there exhibits 

 strange complications, shadows, apparently the precursors of coming events settling 

 down and then vanishing, transitory conditions appearing and disappearing. 



In this field of research the number of labourers has been increasing from year 

 to year; and by the improvements which are rapidly being made in methods of 

 work, an abundant harvest of important results is being gathered in, which is 

 widening and strengthening the basis of the science of Morphology. In the list of 

 those whose labours have conduced to place the science of Embryology in its pre- 

 sent position, no name stands higher than that of Allen Thomson. 



The records of Embryological research for the past few years contain many im- 

 portant additions to our knowdedgo concerning fundamental parts of this science ; 

 some relate to the early formation and primary developmental changes in the egg, 

 and others elucidate later and more specialized conditions of embryonic structure-. 



In dealing with this part of my subject I am in considerable difficulties, as I find 

 myself forestalled in some respects by the President, and hesitate to intrude into the 

 domain which his master-hand has so clearly elucidated. 



Among the researches of the first group I woidd briefly refer to the elaborate 

 observations made by E. van Beneden, Biitschli, Jhering, and Oscar Hertwig, on 

 the primary changes in the ova at the first beginning of development. It had long 

 ago been noticed that (as our President reminded us) the disappearance of the ger- 

 minal vesicle is one of the most universal of the early conditions of incipient growth 

 in the fertilized egg, and the ultimate fate of this nucleus of the egg has been sought 

 for carefully and with varying, but unsatisfactory, results. In 1845 Frey described 

 that at certain early stages one or more singular bodies were found external to the 

 yolk, but within the egg ; and other observers, especially Robin, noticed that these 



