88 THE DAWN OF LIFE. 



among recent Foraminifera), they originate in lacunar spaces 

 on the outside of the proper walls of the chambers, into which 

 the tubuli of those walls open externally ; and that the exten- 

 sions of the sarcode-body which occupied them were formed 

 by the coalescence of the pseudopodia issuing from those 

 tubuli.* 



"It seems to me worthy of special notice, that the canal 

 system, wherever displayed in transparent sections, is dis- 

 tinguished by a yellowish brown coloration, so exactly resem- 

 bling that which I have observed in the canal system of recent 

 Foraminifera (as Polystomella and Calcarina) in which there 

 were remains of the sarcode-body, that I cannot but believe 

 the infiltrating mineral to have been dyed by the remains of 

 sarcode still existing in the canals of Eozoon at the time of its 

 consolidation. If this be the case, the preservation of this 

 colour seems to indicate that no considerable metamorphic 

 action has been exerted upon the rock in which this fossil 

 occurs. And I should draw the same inference from the fact 

 that the organic structure of the shell is in many instances 

 even more completely preserved than it usually is in the 

 ;N"ummulites and other Foraminifera of the Nummulitic lime- 

 stone of the early Tertiaries. 



" To sum up, — That the Eozoon finds its proper place in the 

 Foraminiferal series, I conceive to be conclusively proved by 

 its accordance with the great types of that series, in all the 

 essential characters of organization ; — namely, the structure of 

 the shell forming the proper wall of the chambers, in which it 

 agrees precisely with Nummulina and its allies ; the presence 

 of an intermediate skeleton and an elaborate canal system, the 

 disposition of which reminds us most of Calcarina; a mode of 

 communication of the chambers when they are most com- 

 pletely separated, which has its exact parallel in Cycloclypeus ; 

 and an ordinary want of completeness of separation between 

 the chambers, corresponding with that which is characteristic 

 of Carpenteria. 



" There is no other group of the animal kingdom to which 

 Eozoon presents the slightest structural resemblance ; and to 

 * Op. cit., p. 221. 



