January 20, 1922] 



SCIENCE 



61 



find our eyes dazzled and blinded when we 

 look up from our work-tables to contemplate 

 the brilliant vision of the natural world in its 

 boundless complexity. 



I have put before you very frankly the con- 

 siderations which have made us agnostic as to 

 the actual mode and processes of evolution. 

 When such confessions are made the enemies 

 of science see their chance. If we cannot de- 

 clare here and now how species arose, they 

 will obligingly offer us the solutions with which 

 obscurantism is satisfied. Let us then pro- 

 claim in precise and unmistakable language 

 that our faith in evolution is unshaken. Every 

 available line of argument converges on this 

 inevitable conclusion. The obscurantist has 

 nothing to suggest which is worth a moment's 

 attention. The difficulties which weigh upon 

 the professional biologist need not trouble the 

 laj'man. Our doubts are not as to the reality 

 or truth of evolution, but as to the origin of 

 species, a technical, almost domestic, problem. 

 Any day that mystery may be solved. The 

 discoveries of the last twenty-five years enable 

 us for the first time to discuss these questions 

 intelligently and on a basis of fact. That 

 synthesis wiU follow on an analysis, we do not 

 and cannot doubt. 



William Bateson 

 The John Innes Horticultueal Institution, 

 Merton, London, S. W. 19, England 



THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR 

 THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE 



THE MAIN FEATURES OF THE PROCEED- 

 INGS OF THE COUNCIL AT THE 

 TORONTO MEETING 



The Treasui-er's report for 1921 was ac- 

 cepted and will be published in Science. It 

 shows that the total endowment fuflds uf the 

 Association now amount to $121,414.77. 



The Permanent Secretary's financial report 

 for the fiscal year 1920-21 was accepted and 

 will also be published in Science. The total 

 income of the permanent secretary's office for 

 the fiscal year was $56,463.20. 



The council appropriated the sum of $4,000 

 from the treasurer's appropriable funds, to be 



allotted as grants for research, according to 

 the recoramendations of the Committee on 

 Grants; and it also appropriated $500 from 

 the same funds, to be refunded by the treas- 

 urer to the permanent secretary, on account 

 of a $500 grant made from the permanent 

 secretary's funds early in 1921. 



The council voted (A) that the treasurer 

 should, now and in the future, invest in se- 

 curities only additions to the permanent funds, 

 and that he should invest these additions as 

 soon as practicable after their receipt by him; 

 (B) that the treasurer should hold available 

 for appropriation by the council all income 

 from capital funds; and (C) that the balance 

 of the income now available for grants for re- 

 search after deducting the disbursements for 

 this purpose ($4,500) authorized above, should 

 be held by the treasurer as an emergency re- 

 search fund available for appropriation by the 

 council as gi-ants for research. (By previous 

 action of the council the treasurer pays an- 

 nually to the permanent secretary a sum 

 amounting to $3 for each life or sustaining 

 member still living, on account of the journal). 



The budgets for 1922 of the permanent secre- 

 tary, the general secretary, and the treasurer 

 were approved. 



The action of the executive committee was 

 approved, in the following elections to mem- 

 bership in the Finance Committee: A. S. Fris- 

 sell. New York, N. Y. ; Milton E. Ailes, Wash- 

 ington, D. C. The Treasurer, R. S. Wood- 

 ward, is chairman of the Finance Committee. 



The action of the executive committee was 

 approved in the election of the following mem- 

 bers to emeritus life-membership on account 

 of the Jane M. Smith Fund: Professor B. K. 

 Emerson (M 70, F 77), Amherst, Mass.; Pro- 

 fessor Eugene A. Smith (M 71, F 77), Uni- 

 versity, Ala. 



Forty-eight members were elected to fellow- 

 ship in the association, on nominations duly 

 approved by the section secretaries. 



The council expressed by a rising vote its 

 appreciation of the fact that Past President 

 T. C. Mendenhall, who presided at the first 

 Toronto meeting of the Association, in 1889, 

 had found it possible to be present at the sec- 



