President's Address. 



301 



planets around their Suns in slowly rocking orbits, — of Suns 

 linked in circling round with their fellow Suns, blue, and 

 orange, and green, and crimson, — of Universe linked with 

 Universe, —of immeasurable rings and clusters, and com- 

 plicated spiral whirlpools, lustrous with countless myriads 

 of Suns. But who shall recount to him the unimaginable 

 mysteries of being, — of life, and mind, and soul, called forth 

 by the voice of the Almighty, around each radiant centre ! — 

 Who shall report " their holy triumphs out of evil wrung ! " 

 — Who shall tell of the great Hosanna, arising throughout 

 these illimitable creations, for ever before the all-pervading 

 mercy-seat of God ! 



Again ; — this green duck-pond presents no inviting or 

 miraculous appearance. But the philosopher, still a wonder- 

 ing child, places a drop of its slime under the highest power 

 of the microscope, and a world of beautiful fish-like creatures 

 starts into view, — tl\e green Euglenas. He notes the accu- 

 rate wave-lines of their taper forms, — the long, lashing- 

 trunks by which they scull themselves along, — the brilliant 

 crimson eye-speck, which hints of a sense perhaps unknown 

 to man, — the wonderful provision made for their multipli- 

 cation and preservation, — how a single Euglena, by inces- 

 sant self-di vision, becomes an infinite host, — how, when the 

 summer sun is drying up the puddle which is its Universe, 

 it seals up itself in a cell of horn, like the Indian Fakir, and 

 lies hard and dry in the mud, or floats a speck of dust upon 

 the breeze, until a welcome shower restores it to liberty and 

 life, when it creeps out of its cell again, not one, but a swarm 

 of little Euglenas * 



The filthy scum that coats the common sewer, and hangs 

 in long floating fringes from every stick and stone in our 

 Water of Leith, becomes in like manner transformed into 

 vast assemblages of the most wonderful and beautiful of all 

 animalcules, — into forests of Carchesium, each animal of 

 which is as a many-branched tree of glass, — each branch in- 

 stinct with life, slowly extending, or quickly contracting itself 



* There can be little doubt that the Euglenas are plants, endowed with 

 motion and sensation for light. I have plentifully obtained oxygen gas by ex- 

 posing these organisms to strong sunlight. 



