124. [March 16, 
It will sufficiently indicate the importance of such a general examina- 
tion when it is said that there is a strong probability of the occurrence 
here of a large part of the Archean rocks which lie between the Lower 
Laurentian and the Paleozoic, and that the metalliferous deposits which 
are of undoubted value take their places in a manner analogous to similar 
deposits in the United States and elsewhere. 
It is not intended in these few hasty remarks to present any of the pecu- 
liarities of vegetation, climate and customs to the members of this Society 
as if these were items of news which many of them had not observed for 
themselves, but simply to note a few impressions which may be new to 
some of his hearers as they were to the speaker. 
Along with the luxuriance of the vegetation, the circumstance which 
struck the speaker with most astonishment was the paucity of small ani- 
mals and reptiles and birds in the forests. Ants and their mounds are 
observed everywhere, and small lizards are not uncommon, but snakes 
and toads and field-mice, ete., etc., were conspicuous by their absence. 
During a sojourn of some weeks only one Maha, a black snake some 
two and a half feet in length, was seen in our journeys and camps through 
the forests and over the hills and mountains. The average temperature 
during the day, in the shade, was 81° to 86° Fah. (during the month of 
January), and at night this fell to 71° to 75°. There were occasional 
showers of rain, but as a general rule the weather was delightfully bright 
and calm. The temperature of a mountain stream, taken about 2000 feet 
above the sea at sunset, was 75° Fah. 
[Numerous specimens of coral, modern shells, cocoanuts, bamboo, ete., 
were exhibited, as well as two drinking cups such as are fashioned by the 
mountaineers out of the bamboo by cutting a segment and slicing off the 
rim in a bevel to form a lip.] 
Miss Helen C. de 8. Abbott made the following remarks on 
the Occurrence of a Series of New Crystalline Compounds in 
Higher Plants: 
“In many plants, especially those which belong to the natural orders, 
Simarubacer, Polemoniacew, Rubiacese, Ebenacez, Rhodoracexe, and 
Composit occur, respectively, a class of compounds which present defin- 
ite crystalline forms. They are extracted from the plants most readily 
by a light petroleum ether. Boiling absolute alcohol was used to purify 
these compounds from fats, wax, and coloring matter, and by fractional 
crystallization three distinct forms of crystals were obtained which on ul- 
timate analyses represented compounds of different chemical constitution. 
“These bodies are characterized by containing a high percentage of 
carbon. They are indifferent to alkalies and have high melting points. 
The discovery of one of these compounds in Cascara Amarga was made 
by me in 1884, and announced at the Buffalo meeting of the American 
