the half-century-old real or fancied memories of a nonagenarian as contributions to the history of the most notable event in the annals of Biology that had followed the appearance in 1735 of the “Systema Naturae” of Linnaeus.

Following Sir J. Hooker, the President, referring to Prof.  Haeckel, who was unable to be present, said that he was “the great apostle of the Darwin-Wallace theory in Germany ... his enthusiastic and gallant advocacy [having] chiefly contributed to its success in that country....  A man of world-wide reputation, the leader on the Continent of the ’Old Guard’ of evolutionary biologists, Prof.  Haeckel was one whom the Linnean Society delighted to honour.”  Two more German scientists were honoured with the Medal, namely Prof.  August Weismann (who was also absent), and Prof.  Eduard Strasburger, the latter paying a special tribute to Wallace in saying:  “When I was young the investigations and the thought of Alfred Russel Wallace brought me a great stimulus.  Through his ‘Malay Archipelago’ a new world of scientific knowledge was unfolded before me.  On this occasion I feel it my duty to proclaim it with gratitude.”  The Medal was then presented to Sir Francis Galton, who delivered a notable speech in responding.  The last on this occasion to receive the Medal was Sir E. Ray Lankester, who, in replying to the President’s graceful speech, referred to the happy relationships which had existed between the contemporary men of science of his own time, but with special reference to Darwin and Wallace he said: 

Never was there a more beautiful example of modesty, of unselfish admiration for another’s work, of loyal determination that the other should receive the full merit of his independent labours and thoughts, than was shown by Charles Darwin on that occasion....

Subsequently, throughout all their arduous work and varied publications upon the great doctrine which they on that day unfolded to humanity ... the same complete absence of rivalry characterised these high-minded Englishmen, even when in some outcomes of their doctrine they were not in perfect agreement....  I think I am able to say that great as was the interest excited by the new doctrine in the scientific world, and wild and angry as was the opposition to it in some quarters, few, if any, who took part in the scenes attending the birth and earlier reception of Darwin’s “Origin of Species” had a prevision of the enormous and all-important influence which that doctrine was destined to exercise upon every line of human thought....  It is in its application to the problems of human society that there still remains an enormous field of work and discovery for the Darwin-Wallace doctrine.

In the special branch of study which Wallace himself set going—­the inquiry into the local variations, races, and species of insects as evidence of descent with modification, and of the mechanism by which that modification is