52 Address of the President at the Annual Meeting. 
which the egg-capsules of other pectinibranchiate mollusks 
are to be met with in any quantity, will do a most acceptable 
service to science, by determining how far the same history is 
common to other species ; and I would particularly instance 
the Buccinum undatum, or common Whelk, whose egg-cap- 
sules are to be found in masses upon almost every shore 
during the spring months, and the history of whose develop- 
ment, though studied by MM. Koren and Daniellsen, has 
probably been as much misunderstood and misdescribed by 
them, as I have shown that of Purpura to have been. 
With respect to the paper read at our last Meeting, on 
Desnidium margaritiferum, I am in like manner precluded 
from making the comments which I might have otherwise 
offered, by the circumstance that its authoress is a near 
relative of my own, and that it was communicated to the 
Society through myself. I may remark, however, that 1 
preferred that it should come before the Society in its ori- 
ginal simple form, rather than myself work it up into a more 
formal and systematic memoir ; because I considered it to be a 
good example of a style of contribution to Science which is 
much needed, and which it is within the power of even the 
unlearned microscopist to furnish, provided only he be com- 
petent as an observer, and truthful as a narrator of facts, — I 
mean a simple record of observations upon single types of 
structure, carried on over a long period of time, so as to aid in 
the determination of the changes which they present in the 
course of their development. This is particularly needed with 
regard to the whole group of Infusorial Animalcules, our 
knowledge of which may be said to be only in its infancy ; 
for notwithstanding the industry with which these objects 
have been studied by Professor Ehrenberg, and the prestige 
he has acquired with the public as the highest authority in 
regard to them, yet it is progressively becoming more and 
more evident, that the whole of the great fabric which he has 
erected rests upon a most insecure foundation, and that the 
Anatomy, Physiology, and Systematic arrangement of the Infu- 
soria, need to be restudied completely ah initio. For, in the first 
place, there can be no doubt whatever, that a large proportion 
of the so-called infusory animalcules belong to the vegetable 
kingdom, and that a great number of the species described 
by Professor Ehrenberg and other observers of the same class, 
are but different phases of development of one and the same.* 
Further observation will doubtless lead to much additional 
light upon this subject, many parts of which are still wrapped 
* See, for example, Cohn's * Memoir on the Natural History of Proto- 
coccits pluvialis,^ published by the Eay Society, 1853. 
