President's A ddress. 
109 
near Auchterarder ; the supposed meteorite having been 
sent to him, after a chemical analysis made by our distin- 
guished member, Dr Murray Thomson, proved to be a mass 
of bisulphide of iron, accompanying common coal, and in 
no way connected with meteoric phenomena. In physiology 
and zoology, excellent papers have also been produced. Mr 
Edwards " On Torn-off Digits in Man, with reference to 
analogous injuries in the Lower Animals,'' and his ingenious 
and instructive " Notes on some Surgical Homologies ; " 
Professor MacDonald s able and learned exposition " On the 
Osteological Homology of the Vertebrate Cranium ; " and 
Kemarks on a Peruvian Skull,'' by Dr James M'Bain. Dr 
Thomas Strethill Wright continues his brilliant and original 
" Observations on British Zoophytes," which have already 
stamped him as one of the best and most accurate observers 
of the present day. Other zoological papers by Dr John A. 
Smith, Mr Wm. Kamsay M'Nab, Mr Ghas. Peach, and Mr 
George Logan, are also worthy of commendation. This, it 
will be confessed, is a goodly amount of work done during 
the past Session, both in extent and variety, and is at once 
an index of the vigour that now animates the Society, and 
a good security for continued progress. 
In the midst of our congratulations we are admonished by 
the solemn warning that death has again entered our ranks, 
and snatched from amongst us one of our best and most 
eminent members. Since last meeting the Society has to 
deplore the loss of Dr John Coldstream, who, had he lived, 
would have occupied the chair as Senior President during 
this Session — an office which he formerly held with credit to 
himself and advantage to the Society. It would be difficult 
to over-estimate the worth and excellence of character of 
this most amiable and estimable man. His intimate friends 
were not more struck with his modest unassuming manner, 
than by the wide and varied range of scientific knowledge 
he possessed. And it soon became evident to those less 
familiar with him, that this information had been acquired 
by diligent personal observation made on the animals and 
plants that inhabit our marine shores, as well as by carefully 
conducted experimental researches performed in the bbora- 
