SERIES OF FORMS IN SPONGES. 03 



elusion, proved in special instances, that in this group 

 of low organisms which secrete the most delicate cal- 

 careous shells, there could be no question of " species," 

 but only of "series of forms." Forms which the sys- 

 tematists had reduced to different genera and families, 

 he beheld developing themselves from one another. 

 These Foraminifera are, however, so simple in structure, 

 the history of their individual evolution or Ontogenesis 

 is, as yet, so little known ; they contribute so little 

 microscopic detail, which might formulate the law of 

 transmutation of species, that the champions of persist- 

 ency of species might still seek refuge in the assertion 

 that Carpenter's series of forms are mere varieties, and 

 only prove that the true " species " have not yet been 

 found. 



We may now turn with advantage to the class of the 

 Spongiadse, the importance of which in the question of 

 species I was the first to point out.'^ With them, as I 

 summed up my researches, it is not as with the Forami- 

 nifera, merely an affair of the general habit of the form, 

 of the variable grouping of the chamber systems ; but the 

 variability exists still more specially in the microscopic 

 detail than in the coarser constituents. In the Forami- 

 nifera we may speak of microscopic forms, but not pro- 

 perly of microscopic constituents. But in the sponges 

 we discern the transformation of the finer morphological 

 constituents, the rudimentary organs, and we thereby 

 gain an insight into the mutability of the whole. In this 

 respect the calcareous sponges are somewhat differently 

 circumstanced from the rest, and from the silicious 

 sponges in particular. In the former, the variability of the 

 microscopic parts is limited to a smaller circle of forms, 



