164 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



English writers are few and their observations scattei-ed. There 

 is a list of British gall insects (of all orders) by Mr. Miiller in the 

 "Entomologist's Annual" for 1872, and also an admirable series 

 of papers on Scottish galls which appeared in volumes I. and II. 

 of the " Scottish Naturalist," from the pen of Mr. J. W. H. Traill, 

 M.A., to which I have more than once referred in the course of 

 my paper. Scattered notes, principally by Mr. Miiller, are to be 

 found in the " Entomologist's Monthly Magazine," and also some 

 observations by Mr. Inchbald in the extinct " Entomologist's 

 Weekly Intelligencer." 



7th March, 1876. 

 Mr. James Allan, Vice-President, in the chair. 



SPECIMENS exhibited. 



By Mr. Adolf Schulze. — A portion of a log of Walnut in which 

 some large larvse had been found, and also the larvae themselves. 



Mr. R. H. Paterson explained by a diagram the arrangement of 

 the organs of a plant, Aristolochia Thwaitesii, which were formed 

 for the prevention of self-fertilisation. 



PAPERS READ. 



Mr. W. J. Milligan read a paper on " Some of the Flowers 

 mentioned by Sbakspeare." The object of the paper was to point 

 out that scientific workers generally, in their papers read before 

 mixed audiences, are apt to be too technical, and to appeal only to 

 the colder intellectual faculties. The essayist pled for a more 

 enlightened and a broader method of treating scientific subjects ; 

 that scientific writers in their popular papers should try to edu- 

 cate the imaginations of their hearers and so attract them to a 

 study of nature. He asked men of science not to be content with 

 an isolated desci-iption of a bare fact, but to place it before his 

 audience in its relations with other things. As an illustration of 

 the poetical method of treating botanical facts, he selected pas- 

 sages from Shakspeare, and entered upon the legendary plant lore. 

 He also pointed out the desirability of at least indicating the mean- 

 ing of technical terms with which only a specialist may be supposed 

 to be acquainted, and the pleasure to be derived from tracing the 



