INTRODUCTION. 
Though the following “ History of the British Sea- 
anemones and Corals ” is intended for general readers, it 
seems desirable that it should be accompanied by a brief 
Thumi of what is known concerning the anatomy and 
physiology of this order of animals. I have commenced the 
text of the work with a general description of the con- 
stituent parts of their bodies, in order to establish a 
determinate orismology for the class, and shall here assume 
that the reader is sufficiently familiar with the various 
organs, and the terms by which they are indicated. 
The Sea-anemones present a low grade of animal 
existence, and are commonly represented as exceedingly 
simple in structure. The term “ Animal-flowers,” by 
which they were known to the early observers, and which 
has been perpetuated in the Greek equivalent “ Anthozoa,” 
applied to the class by some modern natm-alists, has been 
thought to express the fact, that a vegetable type of 
organization is scarcely less proper to them than an animal 
one. It is, however, to the accidental resemblance which 
these beautiful forms often bear to a highly-colom-ed and 
many-petaled flower, that the name owes its appropriate- 
ness, rather than to any close assimilation to the vegetable 
structure. The Sea-anemone is an indubitable animal, and 
its organization is more complex than is usually supposed. 
This will be seen as we proceed with the successive ex- 
amination of the organs.* 
* In all cases in which I do not adduce any other authority, the following 
statements may be considered as given on the authority of my own dissec- 
tions and observations. 
