120 
PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. 
only three years ago, without money, without influence, and without the 
prestige of great name, has had such a list of papers, everyone from a 
resident or corresponding member ; when its doings have come to be 
quoted with respect if not with entire acceptance by the leading organ 
of our special branch of science in the Old World ; when such men as 
Professor H. L. Smith, the greatest living authority on the Dia- 
tomacese ; Mr. W. H. Walmsley, of Philadelphia ; Professor J. E. 
Smith, of Ashtabula, Ohio, and others of like fame, are not ashamed to 
be ranked among its corresponding members, I cannot but feel that it 
is an honour to be a member of the Dunkirk Microscopical Society. 
In the past we have exercised a wise liberality ; we have done well 
and wisely in admitting ladies to membership. We have in our papers 
covered wide ground. Dr. Ailing has discovered of our native Lepi- 
doptera, and Eev. Mr. Adams has explained for us some of the 
wonders of their anatomy. The Rev. Dr. Armstrong has told us of 
the life-history of the Diatomaceae, those marvellously minute and 
beautiful organisms so long tossed about between the animal and 
vegetable kingdoms. Professor Mark has told us of the Protista, 
the lowest of organisms, neither animals nor plants, which Haeckel 
has erected into a kingdom of their own ; and Mrs. Shelton has 
recorded her observations on one of the plants possessing functions 
heretofore supposed to he the exclusive prerogative of animals. Mr. 
Fell has treated of the Acarinae, the miths ; and Dr. Ailing has set 
before us the microscopy of the blood, the vital fluid on which our 
earthly being depends. Professor Smith and Mr. Morehouse have 
discoursed of methods of illumination and manipulation, and the 
former has shown us how great skill may be obtained by careful and 
patient labour, and initiated us to the methods of testing our lenses, 
which, by discovering their faiilts, have led to their improvement ; 
and your President has endeavoured to lay before you the principles 
which govern the construction and use of the microscope itself. 
Thus no side of our subject has been neglected ; the optical and 
physical, the test-object side if you will, has received attention, while 
we have not neglected what a writer in the ‘ American Naturalist ’ has 
somewhat impertinently termed “ the legitimate natural history appli- 
catives of the microscope,” as if it was not as legitimate to apply the 
microscope to the investigation or settlement of a moot point in 
physics as of zoology, histology, or pathology. Once more, then, I 
ask if the record is not one in which we may take a reasonable pride, 
and from which we may draw inspiration for renewed efforts to do still 
better in future. Let us then continue to work together, not for the 
sake of popularity, not for the sake of reputation, of natural gain, nor 
even for the material gain our labours may bestow upon the world, 
but purely for the love of science, and the successes of the past shall be 
but a feeble prelude to the greater and better successes that are to come. 
I have rendered an account of my stewardship ; I acknowledge my 
many shortcomings as a presiding officer and executive ; it only re- 
mains for me to thank those who have aided us, and especially our 
Secretaries, Mrs. Shelton and Dr. Ailing, for their efficient aid, and 
to resign my charge into other abler and more energetic hands. 
