264 



Presents. 



[Mar. 7, 



as taking place in the " proligerous pellicle" may be watched by all who 

 are conversant with such methods of investigation. We do not require to 

 call in the aid of the chemist ; we need exercise no special precautions ; the 

 changes in the pellicle are of such a kind that they can be readily appre- 

 ciated by any skilled microscopist. 



Just as I have supposed that living matter itself comes into being 

 by virtue of combinations and rearrangements taking place amongst in- 

 visible colloidal molecules*, so now does the study of the changes in the 

 " pellicle " absolutely demonstrate the fact that the visible new-born units 

 of living matter behave in the manner which I have attributed to the in- 

 visible colloidal molecules. The living units combine, they undergo mole- 

 cular rearrangements, and the result of such a process of heterogenetic bio- 

 crasis is the appearance of larger and more complex organisms ; just as the 

 result of the combination and rearrangement, between the colloidal mole- 

 cules was the appearance of primordial aggregates of living matter. Liv- 

 ing matter is formed, therefore, after a process which is essentially similar 

 to the mode by which higher organisms are derived from lower organisms 

 in the pellicle on an organic infusion. All the steps in the latter process 

 can be watched ; it is one of synthesis — a merging of lower individualities 

 into a higher individuality. And although such a process has been pre- 

 viously almost ignored in the world, of living matter, it is no less real than 

 when it takes place amongst the simpler elements of not-living matter. In 

 both cases the phenomena are essentially dependent upon the "properties" 

 or " inherent tendencies " of the matter which displays them. 



The Society then adjourned over the Easter Recess to Thursday, April 1 1 . 



Presents received March 7, 1872. 



Reports, Observations, &c. 



Calcutta : — Geological Survey of India. Memoirs. Palaeontologia Indica. 

 Ser. YI. The Pelecyjpoda, by F. Stoliczka (Cretaceous Fauna. 

 Yol. III. No. 9-13). Ser. YII. Kutch Fossils, by F. Stoliczka. 

 4to. 1871. Records. Yol. IY. Pt. 3, 4. roy. 8vo. 1871. Observa- 

 tions on the Geology and Zoology of Abyssinia, by "W. T. Blanford. 

 8vo. London 1870. The Survey. 



Coimbra : — Observatorio da Universidade. Ephemerides Astronomicas, 

 1872, 1873. 8vo. 1870-71. Observagoes Meteorologicas feitas no 

 Observatorio Meteorologico e Magnetico. 1866-67. fol. Uso do 

 Instrumento de Passagens pelo primeiro Yertical. 4to. Coimbra 

 1870. Nota sobre a parallaxe equatorial do Sol. 4to. Coimbra 

 1869. The Observatory. 



* Modes of Origin of Lowest Organisms, .pp. 19 & 108. 



