any other hypothesis, but we are not to lose sight of the hypothetical nature of the "primordial forms" it assumes; for a sufficiently large number of observed facts had certainly not been adduced to remove it from the region of speculation. Indeed, at best, the difficulty of deciding the true nature and affinities of obscure fossils was immense.

But the chief difficulty in the way of accepting the doctrine of evolution, when carried to the length for which some contend, is the unbroken continuity of inherited life which it necessarily requires through periods of time whose vastness is such that the mind of man is utterly incapable of comprehending them. They are so vast as to appear incompatible with continuity. We have no reason to suppose that the reproductive faculty in organized beings is endowed with unlimited power of extension; and yet to go no further back than the Silurian period-though the seas which bore the eozoon were probably as far anterior to those of the Silurian as these are anterior to our own -the hypothesis of evolution requires that in that same Silurian period the ancestors of the present living forms must have existed, and that their life had continued by inheritance through all the ramifications of a single geological tree down to the present time; a period of time, to all intents and purposes, infinite.

But is the faculty of reproduction so wonderfully tenacious as all this? Through periods of inconceivable duration, and exposed to influences the most intense and the most varied, has it come down to us in one unbroken stream? Have the strongest which had survived in the struggle for existence necessarily handed down to the strongest which should follow them the power of continuing as a perpetual heirloom the life which they had themselves inherited? Or

have there been many total extinctions and renewals of life? Has there been a succession of genealogical trees, the earlier ones becoming old and dying out, and their places being taken by new ones which have no kinship with the others?

Even if evolution were true, it claims more than it can do justly. No valid evidence has yet been given to lead us to believe that inorganic matter has been changed into living matter, otherwise than through the agency of a pre-existing organism; and there remains a residual phenomenon still entirely unaccounted for : -no physical hypothesis founded on fact has explained the origin of the primordial protoplasm even if it existed, to say nothing of the inconceivable qualities it must have possessed to render evolution possible. Natural selection, the struggle for existence, the survival of the fittest, utterly fail to explain all that biology reveals. Even if they be accepted as accurate explanations of effects, their cause is as profoundly hidden as before. We have looked for it in vain among the physical forces; and we are obliged to rest upon an independent volition, a far-seeing, intelligent design, as its true

source.

A very valuable paper was read in this section by Dr. Burdon Sanderson on the question of spontaneous generation. It was called out by some experiments by Hinzinga, a Dutchman, by which it was supposed that Dr. Bastian's experiments were confirmed. It will be remembered that Dr. Bastian believes that he has shown that organic forms are produced from inorganic matter without the intervention of parents. Dr. Sanderson shows that the Dutch experimenter had not sufficiently heated the fluids employed by him to really destroy all life in them;

and he asserted that his own experiments in no way supported Dr. Bastian's views. His results were of a wholly different nature. They showed that if boiling for as much as an hour were employed, none of the well-known lowly infusion - forms would develop, in which Dr. Bastian had said they invariably did. The same result was obtained by boiling for five minutes, if an increased pressure of two inches of mercury were employed.

Mr. Kay Lankester has also, in union with Dr. Pode, made a series of experiments on the same subject, showing that the claims of Dr. Bastian are assumptions merely, and are not justified by the facts. The gulf between the organic and the inorganic is declared by the latest science to be as great as ever.

Perhaps the most important paper for the year was one by Prof. Ferrier of King's College. He gave an

account of the results he had obtained by the direct stimulation of various parts of the brain by Faradic electricity. He placed a variety of animals, as the cat, the dog, the jackal, the rabbit, the monkey, under the influence of chloroform, and he found that the electrical irritation of the surface of the brain produced muscular movements, and eventually he could predict their nature with great precision. It has yet to be explained how it was that earlier workers in the same line of research received no such results; but there is the highest probability that these are true; and they seem to prove(1) That the surfaces of the brain functionally distinct are remarkably small; sometimes not more than the third of an inch in diameter. (2) Several regions appear by experi

ment to have no connection with the phenomena of motion, especially the fore part of the frontal lobes; but

this is probably peculiar to man and monkeys. (3) The movements produced affect several muscles in groups, and their contractions are so related as to perform definite operations. (4) Stimulating the upper frontal convolutions affects the facial muscles; of the parts behind and below, those of the fore limbs; while the cerebellum affects the muscles concerned in vision. (5) That the seats of emotion mapped out by phrenologists are not coincident with the evidence of these experiments.

Mr. Bennett described the contraction of the glands on the leaves of the curious plant called the sundew. It was found only to occur when albuminous matter comes into contact with their viscous surface, and is not excited by contact with any foreign body. Flies are thus caught and digested, being probably assimilated for the nurture of the plant. Dr. B. Sanderson showed that the American sundew possessed a definite electric current, such as is well known to exist in other leaves and animal tissues; but when it was caused to contract, at the moment of contraction the electric current ceased.

In Anthropology, Physiology, and Anatomy, there was, besides that already noted, much interesting but no remarkably striking work recorded. Chemistry evinced considerable vigour.