60 Proceedings of Pldhsophical Societies. [Jan. 



remarked, he enjoyed an advantage which no anatomist had ever 

 before possessed, and which, periiaps, might never again occur 

 to any one. 



Proceeding to the immediate subject of the Lecture, Sir E. 

 Home stated, that Mr. Bauer had discovered nerves both on the 

 fcEtal aud the maternal surface of the placenta : they extend 

 over the arteries in a kind of trelhs-work, and each hbre, when 

 hio^hly magnified, seems to consist of globules connected toge- 

 ther: they are altogether distinct from any sort of arterial or 

 venous tubes, and reliect the light like white human hairs. — 

 The arrangement of the nerves on the placentee of the seal and 

 fallow-deer was then described. — Sir T. S. Raffles, whose loss 

 of the most valuable collection of subjects of Natural History 

 ever formed in the East Indies, the author observed, every one 

 must feel for, presented him with the pregnant uterus of the 

 Sumatran tapir, in which there is no placenta, the umbilical cord 

 passing from the foetus directly to the chorion ; and in this case 

 the nerves were found in the flocculent part of the latter organ. 



Sir Everard next gave an account of the distribution of the 

 nerves belonging to the organs of generation in the human 

 female, and in those of the quadruped and bird. — He had long 

 since suspected that wherever there were blood-vessels there 

 were nerves, and that the latter, besides their office of conveying 

 sensation, were concerned in the formation of arteries ; and 

 from the extreme vascularity of the placenta, he had inferred 

 their existence in that organ. Mr. Bauer's verification of this 

 inference threw great light upon various facts, hitherto unex- 

 plained, depending upon the connexion of the mother with the 

 foetus; — itshowedthat the brain of the mother is connected with 

 all its nerves. Thus it explained the circumstances, of a foetus 

 formed without brain ; of children dying on the too speedy divi- 

 sion of the navel-strmg ; and of the various ehects ascribed to 

 the influence of the imagination of the mother on the offspring, 

 of which there were too many authenticated instances to reject, 

 though from tlieir not having taken place in certain particular 

 cases, they had been considered as accidental. The Lecture 

 closed with an account of some instances of this kind which had 

 come within the immediate knowledge of the author. One of 

 theui was that recorded in the Philosophical Transactions, of 

 the mare, wliich, havin.o first had a foal by a qiiagga, had ai'ter- 

 wards three foals successively by a Persian horse, all of which 

 were marked like the progeny of the quagga. Illustrative draw- 

 ings by Mr. Bauer were annexed to this Lecture. 



On the Changes undergone by the Ovum of the Frog, during 

 the Production of the Tadpole. By the same Author. 



Sir Everard Home having investigated the gradual changes 

 produced by incubation in the ova of warm-blooded animals, by 

 examining the formation of the chick, had now extended his 



