By Madrepore Corals, we mean fuch Corals as have
thei r cells difpofed in a radiated form, like ftars.
Imperatus was the firft who had any idea of their belonging
to the animal kingdom : this hint he took from
the observations he had made at feveral times on the Ma-
drepora ramea, or great branched Cinamon Coral, which
at length fully confirmed his opinion.
Rumphius deferibes the animal of the Fungus Saxeus,,
orMadrepora Fungites Linn, fo diftindtly, that there remains
no doubt but that he faw it very clearly. He fays,,
while it is alive in the fea, it is covered with a thick vifeid-
matter, like ftarch : that the more elevated folds or plaits,
have borders like the denticulated edges of needlework
lace : that thefe are covered with innumerable oblong ve-
fieles, formed of the fame gelatinous fubftance, which
appear alive under water, and may be obferved to move
like an infect: that as foon as the Coral was taken out of
the fea, and expofed to the air, all the mucous part, with
the little veficles, fhrunk in between the eredt little plates,
or lamelliE, and difappeared; and, in a fhort time, like
the Medufie, or Sea Jellies, melted away, leaving behind;
them a moft aifagreeable fetid fmell; fo that it is clear
from hence that he, before any of the late difeoveries,
was acquainted with the animal nature of the Madrepores..
Befides,. he has plainly told us, that not only the feveral
Corals of the Eaft Indies, but alfo all the other Zoophytes,,
there, when they are frefh, are poffeffed by a gelatinous,
animal of a fifhy nature.
Dr. Peyfonell afterwards confirmed thefe difeoveries,,
and confiders the Madrepore Corals in particular as a meer.
aggregate of the fhells of this animal* which he fays is a
fpecies of the Urtica marina; but it is probable he was.
miilaken in the animal, as will appear hereafter from the.
more:
more exadt obfervations, and an accurate figure of the
animal by Dr. Donati. Dr. Peyfonell has great merit in
fome things; but many o f his difeoveries feem to proceed
more from general conclufions, taken for granted from
fome particular difeoveries, than from judicious and careful
experiments,: In his account of Sponges, he firft
makes them the fabric of the Urtica marina; in another
trial he makes them the fabric of little infedts^ that walk to
and fro in the labyrinth of the tubes, and which taken
out and placed near them, return into their holes again :
but later experiments fliew, that he was entirely miftaken
in both. See the account o f Sponges in the Philofophi-
cal Tranfadtions, Vol. 55. pag. 280.
Dr. Donati has moft clearly explained the nature and
formation of one of this genus of Madrepores by deferib-
ing and delineating the animal, as we find it in Phil.
Tranf. vol. 47. p. 105. tab. 4. He obferve.s, p. 106. that
“ as the figure of this animal bears no refemblance to the
“ Urtica marina, he cannot fee how one could clafs the
“ polypus of the Madrepora with the Urtica.” Perhaps
it maybe neceffary td obferve, that as the internal ftruc-
ture of the cells of many fpecies of this genus differs
in the appearance and difpofition of their lamella?, fo we
may reafonably fuppofe, that the fhape of the particular
animals that form them, may vary from one another.
But we muft leave the particular figures of thefe animals
to future difeoveries.
Laftly, nothing can demonftrate more clearly the
great affinity there is in the growth of Corals with that
o f fhells, than to compare the circles of increafe in
the ffiell of the Limpet, or Patella, with thofe in the under
part of the Madrepora Fungites. In the Limpet, the
animal is under the ffiell; in the Coral, it is upon the
ffiell. How abfurd, thefi, is it to fuppofe that Corals
U 2 compounded