28 Proceedings. 



[Microscopical and Natural History Section^ 



Ordinary Meeting, November loth, 1890. 



Alex. Hodgkinson, M.B., B.Sc, President of the Section, 



in the Chair. 



Mr. Thos. Rogers exhibited three fossil Brachiopoda^ 

 viz.: — Athyris Camillosa^Atkyrisplano-sttlcataydind Spinifera 

 striata^ showing the internal structure laid bare by the 

 Rev. Norman Glass's process of preparation. 



Mr. Chas. Bailey, F.L.S., exhibited a series of Euro- 

 pean specimens of the genus Pedicularis, and for comparison 

 with these Mr. J. CoSMO Melvill sent a number of extra- 

 european species of the same genus. Mr. Bailey pointed 

 out that the peculiarity of their geographical position is the 

 large number of endemic species, as four-fifths of the 

 whole occupy restricted areas of the surface of the globe. 

 Thus Maximowicz has shown that no less than sixty-seven 

 species are confined to China, but this figure is being 

 increased by the researches of French botanists in Yunnan ; 

 Europe has thirty-three endemic species ; India thirty- three ; 

 Siberia and Turkestan twenty-nine ; America twenty-two ; 

 Western Asia fourteen ; and Japan five. Whilst there is great 

 superficial resemblance between individual species, there is 

 little tendency to gradation between them, such as is seen in 

 HieraciuMy Rosa^ RubuSy Salix^ and other Polymorphic 

 genera. Analytical botanists, like Jordain and Boreau, 

 have not created a single species out of any variations in 

 the fifteen species which are found in France — a significant 

 fact when it is remembered what this school of botanists 

 have made out of the Linnean Draba verna. The fixity of 

 the species in Pedicularis is brought into strong relief by 

 the consideration of the circumstance, that botanists have 



