164 THE DAWN OF LIFE. 



analogues to be the seed-like germs of some modem 

 silicious sponges. On the wliole^ if not Foraminifera, 

 they must have been organisms intermediate between 

 these and sponges, and they certainly constitute one of 

 the most beautiful and complex types of the ancient 

 Protozoa, showing the wonderful perfection to which 

 these creatures attained at a very early period. (Figs. 

 46, 47, 48.) 



I might trace these ancient forms of foraminiferal 

 life further up in the geological series, and show how 

 in the Carboniferous there are nummulitic shells con- 

 forming to the general type of Eozoon, and in some 

 cases making up the mass of great limestones.* Fur- 

 ther, in the great chalk series and its allied beds, and 

 in the Lower Tertiary, there are not only vast foramini- 

 feral limestones, but gigantic species reminding us of 

 Stromatopora and Eozoon. f Lastly, more diminutive 

 species are doing similar work on a great scale in the 

 modern ocean. Thus we may gather up the broken 

 links of the chain of foraminiferal life, and affirm that 

 Eozoon has never wanted some representative to uphold 

 its family and function throughout all the vast lapse 

 of geological time. 



* Fusulina, as recently described by Carpenter, AycTkeo- 

 discus of Brady, and the NummuHte recently found in the 

 Carboniferous of Belgium. 



t Parheria and Loftusia of Carpenter. 



