P A E T III.
CHA P T ER I.
GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE DEEP-SEA EHIZOPODAL FAUNA.
B e f o r e proceeding to describe tbe minute structures which constitute the
principal organic element iu the North Atlantic soundings and are distributed
more or less abundantly throughout all the deep-sea deposits of the globe, it is
necessary to adduce my reasons for having embodied in the present work a general
classification of the lowest orders of the animal kingdom which might, with
greater propriety perhaps, have formed the subject of a separate memoir.
In preparing for pubhcation the materials at my command I had the choice of
two alternatives—that is, either to arrange them according to some artificial
system solely with a view to the future identification of particular forms, or,
turning aside from the easy but profitless task of species-manufacture, to apply
myself to the more legitimate purpose of increasing our knowledge regarding the
morphological and physiological characters of the class of creatures to which,
with a few rare exceptions, the various organisms belong.
The elaborate researches of Carpenter, Messrs. Parker and Jones, Williamson,
Schultze, MM. Claparède and Lachmanu, Carter, and others, had already placed
in an entirely new light the nature and relations of the Gromida, Foraminifera,
Actinophryna, and Amoebina ; whilst those of Johannes Miiller * had- put us in
possession of much valuable information respecting the Folycystina and some allied
but stiR more imperfectly known families of Ehizopods. The Foraminifera, with
the single exception of the genus Glohigerina, were neither largely represented in
• ‘Über die Thalassicollen Polycystinen and Acanthouietren des Mittelmeeres/ von Johannes
MüRer. Berlin, 1848.
m
the soundings, nor did they exhibit any very novel or striking characteristics.
The study of this family, moreover, was undergoing such a thorough revision by
the distinguished physiologist whose name stands at the head of the above list,
that any attempt on my part to have forestalled his labours would simply have
been presumptuous*. The Folycystina, on the other hand, were both more
abundantly represented than the Foraminifera, and exhibited such an endless
variety of form as fully to confirm the opinion at which I had long previously
arrived—partly on an examination of living specimens procured in the surface-
waters of the tropical seas, and partly from the study of the fossil Polycystine
earths,—namely, that in no class of organisms is the tendency to variation more
unlimited, or the law of development less understood. To Professor Muller’s
views regarding the proper basis for a classification of the Folycystina, Acantho-
metrina, and Thalassicollidce, it was impossible for me to subscribe, inasmuch as
I differed from him not only iu the value to be placed on mere differences in
form and the mode of repetition of the siliceous portions of these structures, but
in the interpretation of those more important characters upon which the ordinal
separation of the whole of the Ehizopodal families has, in great measure, been
made to depend.
Under these circumstances, and iu the firm conviction that the mere description
and delineation of a number of objects, with no higher aim than that of augmenting
the already perplexing lists of doubtful species, would serve no useful
purpose, I resolved to attempt a revision of the classification of the Ehizopods,
and to import into it as much of the information obtained, both from the soundings
and from other sources, as might be necessary for the due completion of my
object.
In a valuable paper by Professor Carpenter, ‘ On the Systematic Ainangement of
theEhizopoda,” which appeared in the Natural History Review for October 1861f,
* In the ‘ Introduction to the Study of the Foraminifera ’ (page 56), Dr. Carpenter declares that
“ The impracticability of applying the ordinary method of definition to the genera of Foraminifera,
becomes an absolute impossibility with regard to species.”
t I t is necessary to state that the following pages were written subsequently to the appearance of
Dr. Carpenter’s paper in the ‘ Natui-al History Re-riew,’ and th at his admirable ‘ Introduction to the
Study of the Foraminifera’ appeared whilst they were passing through the press. As Professor
Carpenter’s detailed work in nowise contravenes the views expressed in the preliminaiy paper referred
to, I have only felt called upon to modify a few unimportant f