[Microscopical and Natural History Section.]

Ordinary Meeting, October 7th, 1895.

JOHN BOYD, Esq., President of the Section, in the Chair.

Mr. ROGERS exhibited a branch of an acacia from the Royal Botanical Gardens, Regent's Park, the furcated spines of which are hollow at the base, and serve as a nesting-place for a species of ant, which defends the tree from the attacks of leaf-cutting ants.

[Microscopical and Natural History Section.]

Ordinary Meeting, November 4th, 1895.

JOHN BOYD, Esq., President of the Section, in the Chair.

Mr. W. E. HOYLE, M.A., was elected a member of the Section.

Mr. HYDE exhibited a number of plants gathered near Gatley, including the Xenodochus carbonarius.

Mr. OLDHAM exhibited specimens of the British palmated newt, so called from the palmated character of the hind feet. He described the characteristics of the species, one of which is a caudal filament, and mentioned their adaptive and protective colouring, which becomes darker or lighter, according to the colour of the ground on which they live. The specimens exhibited were found in a pond at Romiley.

General Meeting, November 12th, 1895.

FRANCIS NICHOLSON, F.Z.S., Vice-President, in the Chair.

The following gentlemen were elected ordinary members of the Society: W. W. KIRKMAN, Solicitor, 8, John Dalton Street, Manchester; ARTHUR SHEARER, Chemist, Demesne Road, Alexandra Park; JAMES D. PENNINGTON, B.A., B.Sc., Oxford Road, Manchester; WILLIAM J. CROSSLEY, Engineer, Openshaw; JULIUS LEWKOWITSCH, Ph.D., Consulting Chemist, Lancaster Avenue, Fennel Street, Manchester; T. DE COURCY MEADE, M.Inst.C.E., Kenmore, Didsbury; P. J. HARTOG, B.Sc., Demonstrator in Chemistry, Owens College, Manchester; THOMAS HICK, B.Sc., Demonstrator in Botany, Owens College, Manchester; CHARLES H. LEES, D.Sc., Demonstrator in Physics, Owens College, Manchester; FRANK SOUTHERN, B.Sc., Timber Merchant, Manchester.

C

Ordinary Meeting, November 12th, 1895.

FRANCIS NICHOLSON, F.Z.S., Vice-President, in the Chair.

The thanks of the members were voted to the donors of the books upon the table.

Reference was made to the death of Mr. H. D. POCHIN, F.C.S., elected an ordinary member of the Society in 1854.

Professor F. E. WEISS exhibited from the Manchester Museum a specimen of Dictyonema formed by the symbiosis of the fungus Telephora with the alga Scytonema. According to Moeller, Laudatea is only another form of Dictyonema; while Cora is formed by Telephora and the alga Chroococcus.

Ordinary Meeting, November 26th, 1895.

HENRY WILDE, F.R.S., President, in the Chair.

The thanks of the members were voted to the donors of the books upon the table.

Mr. W. E. HOYLE, M.A., exhibited some finely-worked flints recently acquired by the Manchester Museum, collected by Professor Flinders Petrie between Ballas and Nagada, in Upper Egypt. These flints comprised knives, spearheads, and forked arrows believed to have been used for severing the sinews of gazelles, and the necks of birds. The implements are of finer workmanship than any which have been found elsewhere, and are among the evidences which have been collected of the existence of a new race, hitherto unknown, between the sixth and tenth Egyptian dynasties.

Ordinary Meeting, December 10th, 1895.

HENRY WILDE, F.R.S., President, in the Chair.

The thanks of the members were voted to the donors of the books upon the table.

Professor F. E. WEISS, B.Sc., exhibited specimens of Acetabularia Mediterranea and Caulerpa prolifera, two seaweeds recently obtained from Naples for the Manchester Museum. The latter is a single-celled alga differentiated into stem, root, and leaves; the rigidity of the stem and leaf-like expansions is maintained by solid rods of cellulose stretching across the cell space from wall to wall. No reproductive cells of the nature of spores are known in this genus, reproduction by proliferation taking place. The Acetabularia is also a single-celled alga fixed to the rocks by root-like branches; the plant has great rigidity, owing to the walls being strongly impregnated with carbonate of lime. The stalk and disk perish at the end of the season, but the lower creeping portion is perennial.

Mr. THOMAS HICK, B.Sc., exhibited a specimen of Calamites, and read a paper on a "Sporangiferous Spike from the middle coal measures near Rochdale."