HISTORY OF ZOOPIIYTOLOGY. 431 



that the polype-like suckers are so many mouths belonging 

 thereto. 



" Now, for the smallness of the pores, which the Doctor 

 has mentioned here (among the corallines) to be a contradic- 

 tion to animal life ; he certainly has forgot one circumstance, 

 when he introduces the Corallium pumilum album, (Essay 

 Cor. t. 27. f. c.) or his Millepora calcarea (Pall. Blench, p. 

 265.) as an animal, which is, that he there says it has abso- 

 lutely no pores at all. 



"As there can be no doubt, but every part of what is 

 called coralline is necessary to make out such an animal or 

 being, it will be very difficult, if not almost impossible, to 

 determine the proportion there ought to be between softer and 

 harder parts ; and therefore it cannot be thought unreasonable 

 to say, that in some of this tribe the stony parts are by much 

 the greater part of the whole, especially as Doctor Pallas's 

 objection can be only against the crust, or lapidescent part, as 

 the inside of many of them is far from being hard, being 

 exactly like a Sertularia, so that I do not know if it would 

 not be a good definition to one well acquainted with that tribe 

 to say, a coralline is a Sertularia, covered with a stony or 

 calcareous crust ; if the mouths should happen to be very 

 small, their number may make up that deficiency. We see 

 in the greatest number of corallines their surface full of holes ; 

 we saw the same in Escharas and Milleporas thirty years ago : 

 since that time magnifying-glasses have been improved, so as 

 to show us that they are all orifices for polype-like suckers ; 

 why should not we now admit that glasses may be still more 

 improved, so as even to make us able to see what may be the 

 intention and use of these minute orifices, which, according to 

 all rules of reasoning, we must suppose to approach in nature 

 to them they are most alike. From this extreme minuteness 

 then of the pores of these Milleporse, confessed to be zoophy- 

 tes, as well as those of Corallina officiualis as before mention- 

 ed, it is no great matter of surprise, that Doctor Jussieu 

 could not perceive any animal life in the corallines, nor Doctor 

 Schlosser in the Millepora calcarea. As these experiments 

 ought to be attended with many convenient coinciding circum- 

 stances, that do not often happen to persons who only go to the 

 sea-side, perhaps for a few days or hours, so that it is unrea- 



