44 QUARTERLY CHRONICLE. 



Hensen's observations on chickens seem also to authorise a 

 parallelism between the formation of the internal skeleton of 

 Sepiolce and that of the chorda dorsa/is of Vertebrata. M. 

 Mecznikow rejects all analogy between the foot of the 

 Cephalophora and the siphon of the Cephalopoda. He is 

 equally adverse to Hackel's hypothesis, according to which 

 the Pteropoda are the ancestors of the Cephalopoda. 



Hobin's Journal de rAnatomie et de la Physiolgie. Septem- 

 ber and October. 



1. On the Peripheral Termination of Motor Nerves. By 

 Professor S. Trinchese, of Genoa. This paper is illustrated 

 by four very clear and well-drawn plates, in which are 

 figured the " plaques motrices " of various animals in con- 

 nection with the terminating nerve-filament and the sarco- 

 lemma of the muscle-fibre — Echinoderms, Molluscs, Fish, 

 Reptiles, and Mammals. 



These corpuscles are considered by the author to be, with- 

 out doubt, the terminal bodies of the nerves, and he remarks 

 that they are held to be so by Doyere, Quatrefages, Eouget, 

 Kiihne, Krause, Engelmann, Waldcyer, Greef, and Moxon, 

 whilst only Kolliker and Beale refuse to believe in them. 

 The first-named authors are only disagreed as to the connec- 

 tion of the plaques motrices with the cylinder axis. Professor 

 Trinchese's paper, though interesting in many ways, does not 

 throw that light on the subject ■which a careful examination 

 of these bodies in connection with the different methods of 

 preparation used by various authors, would do. He has 

 used very dilute hydrochloric acid as a reagent, and a power 

 of only 300 diameters. It is obviously most unfair in this 

 case, then, to speak of Dr Beale's researches in the slighting 

 manner which he makes use of. He says that Dr. Beale's 

 beautiful drawings give but a confused idea of his observations, 

 and are unlike what can be seen. Now, nearly all impartial 

 observers must admit the faithfulness of Dr. Beale's draw- 

 ings ; he has drawn only what he has seen ; there is nothing 

 diagrammatic in them, as in Professor Trinchese's. Dr. Beale 

 has used a power of 1500 diameters and elaborate methods of 

 preparation ; and only one who will do the same has a right 

 to pronounce upon the truth of Dr. Beale's views. It is not 

 at all improbable that the two views of nerve termination, as 

 to networks and terminal plates, may then be reconciled. 

 Professor Trinchese's observations may be taken for Avhat 

 they are worth — as observations made Avith an ordinary 

 power of 300 diameters — but cannot prove that more than 

 what he has seen cannot be seen. 



Professor Trinchese states his conclusions as follows : — 



