V. 



The Distribution and Generic Evolution of Some 

 Recent Brachiopoda. 



WE had recently occasion to summarise the salient features of some 

 modern publications on the anatomy and development of the 

 Brachiopoda.' The past year was certainly remarkable for the pro- 

 duction of excellent memoirs on this group of organisms. The great 

 work, modestly entitled by Professor James Hall "An introduction 

 to the study of the Genera of Palaeozoic Brachiopoda," noticed in the 

 October number of Natural Science (p. 628) is truly of an epoch- 

 marking character, and a distinct revelation that the problem of the 

 origin of species, so far as the Brachiopoda are concerned, is becoming 

 merged in that of the evolution of genera. 



It may be as well to recall the fact that the results of three 

 American dredging expeditions and several French marine explora- 

 tions have been worked out since Davidson's Report on the 

 " Challenger" Brachiopoda was issued in 1880. It is from a review 

 of the material obtained by the " Travailleur," the "Talisman" (2,3), 

 the scientific mission to Cape Horn of the " Romanche" (4), and three 

 of Prince Albert ist of Monaco's "Hirondelle" voyages (5) that the well- 

 known French conchologists, Dr. Paul Fischer and D.-P. CEhlert 

 hav.e jointly derived the conclusions to which we are about to refer. 

 It is fortunate that the rich harvests of results gathered in such 

 distant regions should have been all entrusted to the experienced 

 hands of the authors of the " Manuel de Conchyliologie et de Palaeon- 

 tologie conchyliologique." They have thus been enabled to formulate 

 generalisations of value concerning the transition of genera, the dis- 

 tribution of some recent species, and their relations to the fossil forms 

 of the Tertiary epoch. It is, perhaps, advisable to premise that 

 Bayle's name Magellania is employed throughout to replace that of the 

 far more familiar generic appellation Waldhcimia of King, the use of 

 which has been abandoned by Messrs. CEhlert, Fischer, Dall and 

 others, becavise it had been previously given a few years before to a 

 genus of hymenoptera ; although, as M. Eugene Deslongschamps has 

 observed, it would seem impossible that anyone could confuse a 



1 Natural Science, vol- i., p. 603. 



