352 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 



here disputing concerning the circulatory apparatus, and 

 yet my remarks in reference to this organ had excited 

 more incredulity than all my other statements. In the 

 eyes of those who ascribed a very exaggerated part to 

 the vascular apparatus, in accordance with their embryo- 

 logical theories, these facts were the less acceptable, 

 because they entirely destroyed their a priori system, 

 while to the greater number it seemed equally impos- 

 sible, from what Cuvier and Blainville had said on this 

 subject, to admit the existence of Gasteropodous Mol- 

 luscs without veins : and thus to many persons Phleben- 

 terism was synonymous with the absence of a circulation. 

 I have, however, shown in the text that this was by no 

 means the view I had advanced.* 



Milne Edwards first undertook independently, and 

 afterwards in conjunction with Valenciennes, a series of 

 observations on the circulation of the Mollusca, which 

 soon led to the very unexpected results to which we 

 have referred in the text, viz., that in all the Mollusca 

 the circulatory apparatus is incomplete ; that there are 

 interruptions in the circulatory circle of all these 

 animals, and that consequently in all the blood must 

 flow into lacunae. These facts and conclusions of the 

 French Academicians were soon independently con- 

 firmed by MM. Pouchet, Van Beneden, and Owen, and 

 it was not long before they were admitted, in almost 

 every country of Europe. In Paris alone there was a 

 small group of incredulous inquirers, who were more or 



* On my return from Sicily, and on the first outbreak of this 

 discussion, I defined Phlebenterism as an anatomical arrangement, 

 which is generally characterised by ramified prolongations of the 

 digestive tube, in virtue of which the digestive apparatus to a 

 certain extent supplies the place of the circulatory apparatus, and 

 aids in the process of respiration. This definition has been con- 

 stantly forgotten by my opponents. 



