THE PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS 13 



Structure,' chiefly ' marked in the form of the bill.' He took as 

 instances a very long-billed lark {Galerita arenicold), resorting 

 exclusively to the deep, loose, sandy tracts, and a very short-billed 

 allied species (G. isabellina), haunting the hard and rocky districts. 

 He then pointed out that there is individual variation in the bills 

 of larks and that the shorter-billed birds would be at a disadvantage 

 in obtaining food from sandy areas but at an advantage among the 

 rocks where strength is required. He concluded, ' Here are only 

 two causes enumerated which might serve to create, as it were, a new 

 species from an old one. Yet they are perfectly natural causes, 

 and such as I think must have occurred, and are possibly occurring 

 still. We know so very little of the causes which, in the majority of 

 cases, make species rare or common that there may be hundreds of 

 others at work, some even more powerful than these, which go to 

 perpetuate and eliminate certain forms " according to natural means 

 of selection." ' 



The temptation to record an amusing incident which happened 

 at one of the meetings of Section D at Manchester, cannot be 

 resisted. Work was proceeding smoothly under the genial guidance 

 of Prof. Newton when, suddenly, Dr. Samuel Haughton of Dublin 

 entered and from the back of the room announced in arresting tones 

 that he had an important communication to make about the animals 

 preserved from the Flood. He believed that Mrs. Noah strongly 

 objected to her husband's intention to take the elephants on board, 

 fearing that their weight would cause a dangerous displacement of 

 the Ark's metacentre. How this domestic difference was composed 

 we had no opportunity of learning, for as the Chairman, whose 

 expression combined sympathetic amusement with mild deprecation, 

 was rising and about to protest, Dr. Haughton, anticipating the 

 result, had already turned towards the door, telling us over his 

 shoulder that he was on his way to make a fuller commimication 

 on the subject to the Anthropological Section. 



After this brief description of an event, which I hope you will agree 

 ought not to be forgotten, we must return to Organic Evolution and 

 to one of the most important subjects debated at any time before a 

 meeting of the British Association — the question, 'Are Acquired 

 Characters Hereditary ? ' — brought before the world by Prof. August 

 Weismann, who was present at Manchester and spoke in the dis- 

 cussion (unfortunately not reported), introduced by Ray Lankester, 

 in which Dr. Hubrecht, Patrick Geddes, Marcus Hartog and the 

 present speaker, took part. Weismann 's conclusion that ' Acquired 

 Characters ' are not inherited, was held by Prof. Goodrich, in his 

 address to Section D at Edinburgh in 1921, to be ' the most important 



