MEMORANDA. 



133 



The other sketch represents a group of Vaffi7iicoke {?), of 

 which several were found in a glass trough ; but they con- 



tradict the assertion that Vaginicolce are solitary or merely 

 double. The gelatinous case in which these were lodged was 

 very irregular, and with no trace of separate cells. — Henry J. 

 Slack_, 34, Camden Square. 



An Astronomer's Protest— When Mrs. Malaprop said that 

 " comparisons were odorous/' she only gave ungrammatical 

 enunciation to a truth which must be admitted by everybody ; 

 and the recognition of which might have spared us from Mr. 

 Henry U. Janson's peroration in his " Further Notices on 

 Finders/' in your last number. Had that gentleman ever 

 read Arago's ' Popular Astronomy/ he would have learned 

 that the determination of the exact tint of a star may lead 

 to the resolution of very remarkable physical questions; 

 while the study of the works of the two Herschels would 

 have shown him that upon the sudden or gradual conden- 

 sation of a nebula may hinge the interpretation of cosmical 

 phenomena so stupendous that the most brilliant discoveries 

 of the microscope pale in insignificance before them. I yield 

 neither to Mr. Janson nor to any one else in my appreciation 

 of the instruction and amusement to be derived from the 

 microscope, but must protest against such a comparison as 

 he makes, even though he may shield himself behind a parade 

 of Dr. Goring's ignorance of astronomy. — A Fellow of the 

 Royal Astronomical and Member, of the Microscopical 

 Societies. 



