1906.] Anniversary Address by Lord Rayleigh. 93 



botanist, Professor W. C. Williamson. In this co-operation he greatly 

 -enhanced the value of Williamson's work. He not only added many new 

 discoveries, but, what was more important, demonstrated the value of the 

 work in relation to phylogeny. 



Dr. Scott has since added much of first-rate importance. He has discovered 

 ■and elucidated many important types, his work constituting a most valuable 

 acquisition to botany from the evolutionary point of view. It is not only in 

 the accurate investigation of difficult structures that Dr. Scott has been so 

 successful ; not the least of his merits lies in the philosophical treatment of 

 the problems suggested by his discoveries. His position as one of the 

 leading palseobotanists in the world is well recognised. He has, both by his 

 personality and by his writings, exercised a well-marked and widespread 

 influence on the work of other botanists. The fact that he has created in 

 this country a vigorous school of palseobotanists may be regarded as an 

 additional claim for the honour now conferred upon him. 



The Davy Medal is given to Professor Eudolf Fittig, Professor of Chemistry 

 in the University of Strassbourg, who began to publish scientific work as 

 early as 1858 and in 1864 discovered the method for the synthesis of 

 hydrocarbons homologous with benzene, which has ever since borne his name. 

 Up to about 1880 he worked chiefly on benzene derivatives, but his attention 

 was gradually attracted to the study of lactones and acids, both saturated and 

 unsaturated, which has largely formed the subject of his numerous published 

 papers down to the present day. 



Fittig has been a remarkably active worker. The Eoyal Society Catalogue 

 contains under his name alone 96 papers, and, jointly with students and 

 others, 71 more down to 1883. Since that time a number about equally large 

 has been recorded in the indexes of the chemical journals. The work of 

 Fittig and his students on lactones and acids, and particularly the inter- 

 molecular changes which many unsaturated acids undergo, may be said to be 

 •classical, and it has had an important influence on the progress of theoretical 

 •chemistry. 



The Darwin Medal has been awarded to Professor Hugo de Vries, For. 

 Mem. E.S. Professor de Vries has made a series of important discoveries in 

 connection with the manner in which new races of organisms may originate, 

 and he has materially extended and systematised our knowledge of the laws 

 affecting the results of hybridisation. His work is the outcome of very 

 •extensive experiments that have been carried on for many years. He has 

 stimulated numerous investigators, both in Europe and in America, 



