272 



NATURE 



YJuly 17, 1879 



PROF. MOEBIUS ON THE 

 QUESTION 



EOZOON 



THE eminent zoologist, Dr. Karl Moebius, of Kiel, 

 has recently published a treatise, " Der Bau des 

 Eczoon canadense nach eigenen Untersuchungen ver- 



glichenmit der BauderForaminiferen"("The Structure of 

 Eos'don canadense, according to my own Investigations, 

 compared with the Structure of Foraminifera "), which first 

 appeared in the " Palseontographica " (vol. xxv.), and was 

 afterwards republished separately. Prof. Moebius in- 

 chnes entirely towards the view of King and Rowney 



i iG. 1. 



{Free. Roy. Irish Acad., ser. i, x. and ser. 2, i.) disputing 

 the organic character of Eczoon. The question is one of 

 such great interest, and the paper is so sure to originate 

 controversy, that we have no doubt the following abstract 

 of the chief points in Dr. Moebius' s treatise will be 

 welcomed by our readers. 



After a concise account of the history of the Eozoon 

 question, since the remarkable discovery by Prof. 

 Dawson and the detailed investigations made by Prof. 

 Carpenter, Dr. Moebius commences the discussion of 

 the subject by stating that he was first led to the study 

 of Eozoon through observation of the structure'^ of a 



F13. 



rhizopod, found by him in 1874 on the coral reefs near 

 Mauritius, and to which he had given the name of Car- 

 fenteria rhaphidodendron. This consists of tree-shaped 

 individuals which often form turf-like growths of several 

 centimetres in length, breadth, and height. Sections of 

 such growths surprised Dr. Moebius by their great like- 



ness' to the representations of Eozoon sections accom- 

 panying the descriptions published by Dawson, Giimbel, 

 Fritsch, &c. He therefore resolved to make a careful 

 investigation of Eozoon and to compare it with Carpen- 

 tcria rhaphidodendron and other foraminifera, in order 

 to form his own judgment regarding its nature, and to 



