188 ■ AlfNIVEESAET ADDEESS 



certainly alive and showed their pseudopodia as well as their long and 

 thick-set spines. Major Owen and Lieut. Palmer, who especially 

 studied the surface-fauna of the Atlantic, observed andhave published 

 the same facts.* Therefore when, in the joint report of my colleagues 

 and myself to the Royal Society on the results of the first ' Porcu- 

 pine ' Expedition in 1869, it was stated or strongly inferred tliat the 

 Globigerinm really " inhabit the bottom on which they are found in 

 such extraordinary abundance," and that the hypothesis accounting 

 for such accumulation by their having fallen to the bottom after 

 death, their lives having been passed at or near the surface, was 

 conclusively disproved, I ventured to record my dissent from that 

 conclusion. The observations of Mr. Murray, one of the naturalists 

 in the ' Challenger ' Expedition, have fully confirmed the hypothesis 

 that Glohicjerina lives on the surface ; and Sir Wyville Thomson 

 now admits f it as an established fact. But Dr. Carpenter is not 

 satisfied. He is of opinion that " whilst the Glohigerince are pelagic 

 in an earlier stage of their lives, freqiienting the upper stratum of 

 the ocean, they sink to the bottom whilst still living, in consequence 

 of the increasing thickness of their calcareous shells, and not only 

 continue to live on the sea-bed, but probably mtiltiplg there — perhaps 

 there exclusively." J I must say that I am not convinced by the 

 instances and arguments which he adduces in support of his opinion. 

 There is no question that a great many species of Foraminifera live 

 always on the sea-bottom ; but I do not know that any species of 

 pelagic or surface-dwelling animal inhabits also the sea-bottom. 

 Dr. "Wallich found that the stomachs of starfishes which came up 

 with the sounding-line from 1260 fathoms contained fresh-looking 

 GloligeritKB, and that the latter were full of sarcodc. This does 

 not prove much ; because sea-water is to some extent antiseptic or 

 retards putrefaction. Many starfishes feed like earthworms, and 

 swallow quantities of organic and inorganic matter for the purpose 

 of extracting nutriment from it. Sir Wyville Thomson says, in his 

 paper " On Dredgings and Deep-sea Soundings in the South 

 Atlantic," § that the appearance of Glohigerina and certain other 

 Foraminifera, " when living on the surface, is so totally different 

 from that of the shells at the bottom, that it is impossible to doubt 

 that the latter, even although they frequently contain organic 

 matter, are all dead." Mr. Murray adds : || — " No living specimen of 

 a Glohigerina, an Orhulina, a Pidvinulina, or of the new genera 



* 'Journal of the Linnean Society,' Zoology, vol. k, p. 14". 



t ' Proc. Eoy. Soc.,' vol. xxiii, p. 34. 



X Ibid.,^. 235. 



§ lb., vol. xxii, p. 427. 



II lb., vol. xxiv, p. 535. 



iA 



