Address of the President at the Annual Meeting. 43 
devotees of large angular apertures to the gentlemen of the 
' turf.' It is, I believe, generally admitted, that the breeding 
a class of horses distinguished by speed and ' blood,' which is 
kept up by the devotion of a certain class of our countrymen 
to the noble sport of racing, is an advantage to almost every 
breed of horses throughout the country; tending, as it does, 
to develop and maintain a high standard in these particulars. 
But no one would ever think of using a race-horse for a roadster 
or a carriage-horse, knowing well that the very qualities which 
most distinguish him as a racer, are incompatible with his 
suitableness for ordinary work. And so I think that the 
* breeders' of first-class microscopes (if I may so designate 
them) are doing great service, by showing to what a pitch of 
perfection certain kinds of excellence may be carried, and by 
thus improving the standard of ordinary instruments ; notwith- 
standing that for nearly all working purposes, the latter may 
be practically superior. 
Turning now to those contributions which exhibit the uses 
of the microscope in scientific research, I find that the 
first paper which came before us, that of Mr. Jabez Hogg on 
the development and growth of the Lymnceus. This memoir, 
although treating of a subject which has already been studied 
more minutely than the author seems to have been aware of, 
has nevertheless added some facts which I believe to be new, 
and which are of great physiological interest ; I refer to those 
which relate to the retardation of the developmental process, by 
insufficiently supplying the animal with food. The nourish- 
ment of the embryo is obtained by means of the current 
produced by the cilia clothing its tentacles (which is also sub- 
servient to the function of respiration), until the gastric teeth 
are sufficiently matured to enable the animal to cut by their 
means the vegetable substances growing in the water, when the 
ciliary fringe disappears. But if, Mr. Hogg informs us, the 
young animal be kept in fresh water alone, without vegetable 
matters of any kind, it still retains its cilia, and attains only 
to a small size ; and its gastric teeth are but very imperfectly 
developed ; and if it be confined to a small narrow cell, it will 
only grow to such a size as will enable it to move about freely. 
By these means Mr. H. has been able so to retard the develop- 
ment and growth of the embryos, that at the age of six months, 
though apparently healthy and active, they were only as far 
advanced as ordinary embryos two or three weeks old; whilst 
other animals of the same brood and age, placed in circum- 
stances favourable to their growth, had attained their full size, 
and had produced young, which were of the full size of their 
elder relations. The physiologist is reminded, by these curious 
