ough he had doubts about the
practicality of reform. His hesitation in regard to eugenic method is
expressed with a wise proviso as to future possibilities: "I have lately
been led," he says, "to reflect a little . . . on the artificial checks,
but doubt greatly whether such would be advantageous to the world at
large at present, however it may be in the distant future." {34a} In the
first edition of the _Descent of Man_ (1874), {34b} he distinctly gives
his adherence to the eugenic idea by his assertion that man might by
selection do something for the moral and physical qualities of the race.
It is a great thing that this Society should have had Francis Galton for
its Honorary President. It entitles us to feel assured that in following
the line of action marked out for ourselves we are on the right track,
and that in the difficult pioneer work of helping the English public to
realise the deadly need of eugenic reform we are following in Galton's
steps. We are also so fortunate as to have received encouragement and
help at the hands of some of the leaders in the science of heredity,
Weismann, Yves Delage, Ray Lankester, the late Adam Sedgwick, Poulton,
Bateson, and others.

Galton says somewhere {35} that great men have long boyhoods. This was
certainly true of him, though I should rather describe as youthful the
delightful qualities that never faded out of his nature. It is, I
believe, the correct thing to speak of the "golden dreams of youth," and
if by this hackneyed phrase we mean a keenly imaginative outlook, a
hopefulness with a certain dash about it, a generous courage--tinged with
romance--then Francis Galton had undying youth. And this makes his
seriously measured progress in eugenics all the more worthy of our
admiration.

In one of the Macmillan articles he wrote: "Many plan for that which they
can never live to see. At the hour of death they are still planning."

It was thus that Francis Galton died, and as year after year we meet
together on February 16th, let us think of him and his plannings with
affection and respect.

III
THE MOVEMENTS OF PLANTS {36}

It is sometimes asserted that the power of movement is a character
distinguishing animals from plants. This statement arises to some extent
from an obvious confusion of thought. Trees are stationary, they are
rooted to one spot, but they are not therefore motionless. We think them
so because our eyes are dull--a fault curable with