PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. O 



imagined it could be ^vitlKll•a^^^l, and which was already occupied by the viscera of the 

 animal. 



Cuvicr, in his Le Rrnne Animal, has adopted some of Miller's errors; while Blainville 

 has, in addition to repeating similar misconceptions, taUen into some unaccountable 

 mistakes resjjecting the C'rinoidea. In his Manuel U Actinologie ou de Zoophytologie, 

 page 262, pi. xxvi, fig. 1, he gives the drawing of a Pentacrmite as the Encriue a panache, 

 ( Actinocrinites polydactylus ) with other errors equally unfortunate. 



Goldfuss has, in his Petrefacta GermaniEe, represented scverid plates of the Echlno- 

 crinus pomum as belonging to the Actinocrinites granulatus, Aide PI. LIX. Jig. 4, a to f. 

 Thus founding a species in one genus, on the evidence of a few disjointed plates which 

 clearl)- appertain to another. It is to be regretted that the practice of founding genera 

 and species on imperfect and broken fragments has been so extensively adopted, that it 

 will require more than ordinary labour to extricate the subject from the labyrinth in 

 which it has become involved. 



Von Buch, in a paper read before the Royal Academy of Sciences, of Berlin, March 

 16tli, 1840, indulges in some novel speculations concerning genera from which Crmoidea 

 originate. In this paper we find the following opinion advanced in the same eloquent 

 language that characterises the whole document. " But before the ocean-lily had 

 opened and expanded its arms, it moved on a short pedicle in the closed state in innu- 

 merable quantit)', and only by frequent and highly varied attempts did this rupture and 

 expansion succeed. These closed Crinoidea are stiU but little and imperfectly known ; 

 they deserve to be known, however, in every respect," &c. 



The theory is ingenious, but we fear it wiU not bear the test of calm investigation, for. 

 unfortmiately for the hj-pothesis, we have Plati/crinifes and Poteriocrinites equally smaU 

 with the minute species which it is supposed Von Buch alludes to, but wliich are never- 

 theless liberally furnished with exceeding long rays, and tentacida as numerous as their 

 more gigantic congeners. If Von Buch's observations apply to the Sphceronites, how 

 can the fact of theii- bcmg destitute of rays accord mtli the opinion that it was "only 

 by frequent and highly varied attempts" that the rupture and expansion of the arms 

 succeeded ; when these same Sphceronites, which are larger than the generahty of species 

 with highly developed rays, are whoUy devoid of rays themsehes 1 



This opinion of Von Buch's savours strongly of "the efforts of internal sentunent" of 

 Lamarck, by which a continual transmutation of species is going on in the organic world, 

 and by wliich the orang-outan has been transformed into the human species. The theory 

 has been already ably refrited by Mr. Lyell in his Principles of Geology, we need there- 

 fore only express our dissent from the views advanced by Von Buch, as to the various 

 species of Crinoidea ever having de\dated fi-om their original types. 



We have some of these closed Crinoidea, but cannot discover the least grounds for 

 supposing that they ever changed their form in the manner indicated by Von Buch, 



