JOIJRNAIj 



OF 'J'HE 



EOYAL MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY. 



APRIL, 1916. 



TRANSACTIONS OF THE SOCIETY. 



IV. — Tlie Supposed Exhibition of Purpose and hitelligeiwe hy 



the Foraminifera. 



By Sir Ray Lankester, K.C.B., F.R.S. 



{Bead March 15, 1916.) 



A GREAT teacher, observer and thinker, Dr. William B. Carpenter — 

 who was President of this Society, and did more to increase our 

 knowledge of the Foraminifera than any other naturalist either 

 before or since his day — first drew attention to the elaborate and 

 skilful construction of their tests, to which Mr, Heron-Allen has 

 recently added many beautiful and striking instances. It is only 

 just to Dr. Carpenter's memory that we who have built upon his 

 pioneer work, in so many directions, should recall his observations 

 and reflections on this subject. In his valuable treatise entitled 

 "Mental Physiology" (1874, p. 41), Dr. Carpenter, after describing 

 the activities of Amoeba in selecting and engulfing food particles 

 by means of its pseudopodia, writes as follows concerning the 

 Foraminifera : — " We can scarcely conceive that a creature of 

 such simplicity should possess any distinct consciousness of its 

 needs, or that its actions should be directed by any intention 

 of its own ; and yet the writer has lately found results of the 

 most singular elaborateness to be wrought out by the instru- 

 mentality of these minute 'jelly-specks,' which build up 'tests' 

 or casings of the most regular geometrical symmetry of form, and 

 of most artificial construction. Suppose a human mason to be 

 put down by the side of a pile of stones of various shapes and 

 sizes, and to be told to build a dome of these, smooth on both 

 surfaces, without using more than the least possible quantity of 



April 19th, 1916 L 



