Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 381 



beak constructed like that of the parrot, the oesophagus, all the 

 organs of generation very nearly repetitions of those of fish,— can it 

 be said of so many things that it is a whole quite differently put to- 

 gether, quite differently combined ? In order to prove this propo- 

 sition, and find in it a text in favour of the most surprising of ano- 

 malies, tliere would be more to be done than in order to sustain the 

 contrary position. For it would be necessary to admit that these 

 organs, which can exist only as produced by each other [engeiidrcs 

 Ics j(/is par les nutres) , and in consequence of the reciprocal congruity 

 of the nervous and circulatory action, would cease to be connected, 

 or to accord with each other. Now such an hypothesis is not ad- 

 missible : from the moment that the harmony between the organs 

 no longer exists, life ceases : then there is an end of the animal, it 

 is not an animal. But if, on the contrary, life goes on, it is because 

 all these organs have remained in their habitual and invariable re- 

 lations, that they act on one another as usual ; — then, following up 

 the reasoning — this is because they are linked together by the same 

 order of formation, subjected to the same rule, and because, like every- 

 thing in animal composition, they are unable to escape Ironi the con- 

 sequences of the universal law of nature, the unity of organic com- 

 position. MINI. Meyrauxand Laurencet have known how to appre- 

 ciate the wants of science, since they have endeavoured to lessen the 

 hiatus observed between the Cephalopoda and the higher animals. 

 Doubtless, they have not hoped to arrive all at once at a result 

 completely satisfactory ; but we owe them at least the justice to 

 say, that theirs is a happy attempt at opening the way, and that 

 they have already trodden some of its paths." 



IVI. Cuvier remarked upon a passage of the above Report, that 

 he had not changed his opinion as to the view to be taken of the 

 aniuials in question. — Rev. Encijc. 



On the 22nd of February M. Cuvier read a Memoir intitled " Con- 

 siderations on the Mollusca, and on the Cephalopoda in particu- 

 lar." — The author brings to mind that it was he who, now thirty-five 

 years ago, after having made the Mollusca better known than they 

 had before been, y)roved the necessity of no longer leaving animals 

 so richly provided with organs, confounded in a single class along 

 with the polypi and other zoo])hy tes ; and that his views on this sub- 

 ject have been admitted in some way or other by all natm-alistfs. 



But, in showing how the organization of the Mollusca approached 

 in tiie abundance and diversity of its parts to that of the Vertebrata, 

 M. Cuvier was far from thinking this oiganizatioii composed in the 

 same way, or arranged on the same plan: hit, opinion, on the con- 

 trary, had always been, that the plan, which up lo a certain point is 

 conmion to the Vertfbrata, is not continued in the Mollusca. And 

 with regard to com|)osition, he never admitted that it could rea- 

 sonably be called one, even taking it only in a single class, and a 

 fortiori in different classes. 



i^ngagcd in a discussion on which he wished to avoid employing 



the 



