I9I5- 



Irish Societies. 



13 



IRISH SOCIETIES. 



ROYAL ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



Recent gifts include a Marmoset from Mr. F. Hoffman, a Blackbird 

 from Mrs. Winkworth, a Silver Pheasant from Mrs. Allen Morgan, a pair 

 of Californian Quail from Dr. Quinton Wallace, Grass Parrakeets from 

 Mr. H. P. Goodbody, and a Diamond Python from Mrs. Stanford Robinson. 



November 18. — A public lecture was given in the Theatre of the Royal 

 Dublin Society (by kind permission of the Council) by Mr. L. E. Steele, 

 M.A., on " Animal Artists of the Ancient World." After reference to the 

 cave -paintings of animals made by Palaeolithic Man, Mr. Steele described, 

 with great wealth of illustration, the zoological features of Assyrian and 

 Egyptian monuments ; pointing out that the specific characters of birds 

 and mammals were often strikingly depicted by the ancient artists, and 

 that the monuments afforded evidence as to the introduction of European 

 and Ethiopian animal types into Egypt under kings of various dynasties. 

 The President, Sir Charles Ball, Bart., expressed the thanks of the 

 large audience to Mr. Steele for his fascinating lecture. 



DUBLIN MICROSCOPICAL CLUB. 



December 9. — The Club met at Leinster House, David McArdle 

 (President) in the Chair. 



Prof. G. H. Carpenter showed a maxilla of the Breeze -fly Therioplectes 

 tropicus, a tabanid, calling attention to the presence of both the galea 

 and the lacinia of a typical maxilla, in the piercing stylet into which 

 the maxilla in these flies has been transformed. 



Dr. G. H. Pethybridge exhibited a " black apple." As exhibited, 

 the fruit was considerably shrivelled, but in the earlier stages, except for 

 the presence of a few spots of Fusicladium on its surface, its only 

 abnormality appeared to be in its colour. Gradually the whole of the 

 internal tissues, with the exception of some layers of cells near the skin, 

 became dried up and the fruit consequently contracted and became 

 wrinkled. These changes are due to the attack of the parasitic fungus 

 Sclerotinia fyuctigena Schroet., which causes the well known " Brown Rot " 

 of fruit. Sections through the peripheral tissues of the apple were 

 exhibited and showed very abundant fungus hyphae in and between the 

 cells. These hyphae as they approach the surface become darker until 

 they reach the cavities of the cells of the epidermis when they are of a 

 dense black colour, thus giving the apple its black skin. On a few areas 

 of the skin there were the first indications of the appearance of fructifying 

 pustules of the fungus but no conidia had yet been produced on them. 

 The specimen exhibited was obtained from Scotland. 



D. M'Ardle showed specimens of Dicranella Schreberi Schp. a very 

 minute moss scarcely half an inch high, which grows in tufts of a bright 

 yellowish green colour. The leaf arrangement in a squarrose direction 

 from a broad amplexicaul erect base, gives the stem a characteristic 

 appearance ; from the broad half -sheathing base, the leaves rapidly 

 contract into a lanceolate subulate limb, which is irregularly denticulate 



