147 
quite inconceivable that it should ever be wholly re-absorbed. 
When its vapourous condition ends a flight of meteors must 
result whose densest part will lie along the comet’s former 
path. 
It was a favourite speculation of the elder HerscheF 
that in their perihelion passage comets lose some portion 
of their more elastic matter, so that what remains behind 
assumes a condition of greater consolidation, whilst other 
astronomers have believed that at each return a comet loses 
something of its former splendour. Upon whatever evi- 
dence these beliefs may rest, the circumstances which tliey 
indicate are a necessary sequence if the theory here advanced 
be true. 
MICROSCOPICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY SECTION. 
Februar}^ 16 th, 1874. 
Joseph Baxendell, F.RA.S, Vice-President of the Section 
in the Chair. 
Mr. Bailey brought under the notice of the Section a 
method which he had used for some years of exhibiting 
slides under microscopes, the audience being seated. This 
was described and explained, and it was proposed that the 
Council be requested to take the matter into consideration 
with a view to its being put into use at the meetings of the 
Section. 
Mr. T. S. Pease exhibited and explained a series of slides 
which he had brought for examination, showing the internal 
anatomy of the cockroach. 
"Observations at tlie Cape,” p. 411. 
t Smyth’s " Cycle,” vol. 1, p. 235, 
