ILLUSTRATIVE NOTES. 315 



whose illustrations appear of a superior character, although still 

 defective. I have seen a part of a new collection of engravings, much 

 more carefully executed. 



Page 14. Gelatinous and nourishing seas. Humboldt, in one 

 of his early works (" Scenes in the Tropics "), was the first, I think, 

 to authenticate this fact. He attributes it to the prodigious quantity 

 of medusae, and other analogous creatures, in a decomposed state in 

 these waters. If, however, such a cadaverous dissolution really pre- 

 vailed there, would it not render the waters fatal to the fish, instead 

 of nourishing them ? Perhaps this phenomenon should be attributed 

 rather to nascent life than to life extinct, to that first living fermen- 

 tation in which the lowest microscopic organizations develop them- 

 selves. 



It is especially in the Polar Seas, whose aspect is so wild and 

 desolate, that this characteristic is observed. Life there abounds in 

 such excess that the colour of the waters is completely changed by 

 it. They are of an intense olive-green, thick with living matter and 

 nutriment. 



Page 91. Our Museum. In speaking of its collections, I may 

 not forget its valuable library, which now includes that of Cuvier, and 

 has been enriched by donations from all the physicists of Europe. I 



have had occasion to acknowledge veiy warmly the courtesy of the 

 conservator, M. Desnoyers, and of M. le Docteur Lemercier, who has 



