284 Linnaan Society. 



soon after it has left the pupa state. These facts are regarded as 

 proofs, by direct observation, of the function of the corpuscle, and 

 of its analogy, both in function and development, to the secreting 

 cells of glands. 



In the second division of his paper, the author draws some com- 

 parisons between the blood-corpuscles of insects and the Vertebrata, 

 and gives the details of a series of observations on the blood of a 

 human foetus that was born alive at the end of the sixth month. 

 The blood of the parent, and of the placenta, was examined, and 

 also of different parts of the body of the foetus a few hours after 

 death. The general results observed were, that the blood of the 

 parent contained a very large quantity of white chyle corpuscles, 

 and was extremely coagulable : the blood of the placenta contained, 

 beside an abundance of chyle corpuscles, red blood-discs of ex- 

 tremely variable sizes, the largest being one-third or one-fourth 

 larger than those of the mother, and the smallest scarcely more than 

 one-fourth as large as the largest. There were also an immense 

 abundance of molecules and nucleoli, from which latter the red blood- 

 discs appeared to be developed. The blood of the vein and lungs 

 presented a similar irregular condition as to size of the corpuscles, 

 while that of the left auricle of the heart, aorta and arteries of the 

 cord was more uniform in its character. From these observations 

 the author concludes, that the blood of the Vertebrata is analogous 

 in its mode of development to that of the insects and other Inverte- 

 brata, and that the red blood-discs are the ultimate developments of 

 the opake white granules or nucleoli of the blood. 



LINN^AN SOCIETY. 



December 17, 1844. — R. Brown, Esq., V.P., in the Chair. 



Dr. Lankester, F.L.S., exhibited a specimen of an Agaric in which 

 gills were developed on a portion of the surface of the pileus, directly 

 over the stipes, resulting apparently from an extension of the growth 

 of the stipes, and a rupture of the external membrane of the pileus, 

 throwing up the internal or gill-producing membrane. 



Read, '* Additional Remarks on the Spongilla fluviatilis." By John 

 Hogg, Esq., M.A., F.R.S., F.L.S. &c. 



In this paper Mr. Hogg commences by claiming a priority to M. 

 Laurent in the discovery of the locomotive germ-like bodies of Spon- 

 gilla, and in comparing them with the spontaneously moving spo- 

 rules of Ectosperma clavata of Unger. In proof of this priority he 

 refers to his memoir, published in 1840, in the eighteenth volume of 

 the Society's Transactions, in the first part of which, read before the 

 Society on the 18th of December 1838, those bodies are described 

 as having been observed by him in August 1838, and are compared 

 with the locomotive sporules of the Ectosperma. An abstract of this 

 part of Mr. Hogg's memoir appeared in the ' Proceedings* of the So- 

 ciety at the beginning of 1839, and was reprinted in the number of 

 the * Annals of Natural History' for March 1839. Of these several 

 publications Mr. Hogg states that no notice is taken by M. Laurent 



