264 
PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. 
been the means of enabling the thinkers to arrive at greater ends. We 
are searching after the truth, and while we are each doing so according 
to our lights, we can take with the poet the consolation that “ Some 
are and must be greater than the rest.” The report of work done 
during the past year under the able presidency of Dr. Francis Taylor, 
which our Honorary Secretary has just read, is, I am sure, a sufficient 
guarantee of our zeal. It would be invidious to specialize papers 
where so many able ones have been given, so I will conclude, gentle- 
men, with the wish that the closing of this session may give us as 
goodly a list. 
Bristol Microscopical Society.* 
The 359th meeting of the Society was held on Wednesday, 
November 21, at the Bristol Museum and Library, Mr. W. J. 
Fedden, President, in the chair. 
The Hon. Secretary, the Rev. P. Sleeman, submitted a statement 
of the financial condition of the Society ; after which a paper was 
read by Mr. W. W. Stoddart, F.G.S., &c., upon the “ Fossil Microzoa 
of Clifton and the neighbourhood.” 
The writer directed the attention of the members of the Society 
to the exceeding richness of the strata in the neighbourhood of Bristol 
in various microscopic forms of animal life. He pointed out the 
different localities which, from personal experience, he had found 
well suited for careful examination ; referring especially to the 
cuttings on the Avonmouth Railway, Aust, Horfield, Portishead, &c. 
He exhibited a large collection of interesting objects obtained and 
mounted by himself, which abundantly illustrated the wealth of 
the carboniferous and other strata in the districts to which he 
referred. Several of the species shown have been recently described 
by Mr. H. Brady, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, in the Memoirs of the 
Paheontographical Society. The writer also remarked upon the im- 
portance of a thorough and systematic search of the lias deposits around 
Bristol and Clifton, and the desirability of classifying and arranging 
the microscopic organisms found therein ; calling attention to the fact 
that minute and insignificant as the specimens discovered may appear, 
yet that these will often afford as reliable and valuable an index to the 
previous history of the different formations as do the fauna and flora 
of larger size. Mr. Stoddart concluded by mentioning his discovery 
of what seemed to be an entirely new species of insectivorous mammal 
in the post-pliocene deposits in veins at Hoi well, Mcndip; in the 
further study of which he was engaged. 
The meeting was largely attended, and Mr. Stoddart’s paper was 
listened to with much interest. 
Mr. T. J. Culverwell was elected a member of the Society. 
From the Hou. Secretary. 
