Murrai/s Researches in Natural History. 159 



face of the earth, by creating new stations for the abode, in- 

 dustry, and all. the local enjoyments of man. In the greatest 

 depths of the ocean, the despicable zoophyte {zoon, an ani- 

 mal, phyton, a plant ; partaking of both natures) founds its 

 habitations. The most remarkable of these is the coral struc- 

 ture, which, gradually enlarging in dimension, from the 

 bottom upwards, at last rises above the surface of the sea, and 

 becomes in time clothed with vegetation, birds, insects, and all 

 the aggregations of surrounding waters, is at last seized on, and 

 falls under the dominion of man. This idea is beautifully ex- 

 pressed by Humboldt in his Physionome des Vegetaux^ Tableaux 

 de la Nature, p. 11. 



On the Torpidity of the common Tortoise, — This is a curious 

 account of the temporary stagnation, or suspension of active 

 life in the tortoise, dormouse, and other animals called sleepers. 

 During this cessation of action in the winter months, k has 

 been proved that the temperature of sleepers is diminished ; 

 the circulation of their blood is slower ; respiration less fre- 

 quent, and sometimes entirely suspended ; the action of their 

 stomach and digestive organs are also suspended; and the 

 irritabihty and sensibility of the muscular and nervous powers 

 are diminished. Heat and air are the only agencies which 

 rouse them from their death-like lethargy. This paper con- 

 tains historical accounts of individual tortoises, which have 

 been kept by some of the English bishops at their palaces. In 

 the library of Lambeth Palace is the shell of one brought there 

 in J 623 ; it lived until 1730, and was killed by being carelessly 

 exposed to the inclemency of the weather. Another at the 

 episcopal palace at Fulham, procured by Bishop Laud, in 

 1628, died in 1753. One at Peterborough was known to have 

 lived 220 years ! This animal was seen by the author in 1813, 

 and of which he gives an interesting account. 



On the torpidity of animals, the author takes occasion to 

 remark, that the lethargy of the toad and lizard may continue 

 without the extinction of life for ages. Both these animals 

 have been found alive imbedded in stone ; " a toad was found 

 under the coal seam, in the iron-stone over which it rested, in 

 a coal-mine at Auchincruive in Ayrshire." This circumstance, 

 in the author's opinion, completely invalidates the Huttonian 

 theory of the primitive formation of the earth ; and in course 

 shows his belief in that which is called the Neptunian. 



M. 



