558 DE. W. B. CARPENTER ON ORBITOLITES TENUISSIMA. 



much more specialised character. And when this transition has been once made, there 

 appears no disposition whatever, in the reparation of injuries, to a reversion to the 

 earlier plan. Now, this is a "pregnant instance" of the following "law of formation," 

 sagaciously laid down long since by Sir JAMES PAGET : " When, in an adult animal, 

 a part is reproduced after injury or removal, it is made in conformity, not with that 

 condition which was proper to it when it was first formed, or in its infantile life, but 

 with that which is proper according to the time of life in which it is reproduced ; 

 proper, because like that which the same part had, at the same time of life, in 

 members of former generations." And the study of this humble Orbitolite will be 

 found, not only in this, but in other particulars, to justify the profound remark made 

 by the same philosophic Pathologist,* long before the promulgation of the doctrine of 

 "evolution," that, " if we are ever to escape from the obscurities and uncertainties of 

 our art, it must be through the study of those highest laws of our science which are 

 expressed in the simplest terms in the lives of the lowest orders of creation." 



Geographical, Bathy metrical, and Geological distribution. 



So far as is at present known, Orbitolites tenuissima inhabits only the North 

 Atlantic Ocean and the seas in communication with it. The first complete specimens 

 were obtained in the " Porcupine " dredgings of 1869, at depths of from 630 to 1,443 

 fathoms, between the north-west of Ireland and Eockall Bank. In the " Porcupine " 

 expedition of 1870, however, it was brought up from a bottom of only 64 fathoms in 

 Setubal Bay, on the coast of Portugal, and afterwards from a shallow bottom within 

 the Mediterranean, near Carthagena. That it is an inhabitant of other parts of the 

 Mediterranean I then inferred from the fact that I had detected fragments of it in 

 the Foraminiferal dredgings, made at 250 fathoms by EDWARD FORBES and Lieut, 

 (now Admiral) SPRATT in the JSgean, in 1842; and it is stated by Dr. J. GWYN 

 JEFFREYS, in his " Report on the Biology of the ' Valorous ' Cruise," that it has been 

 dredged by the Marquis DU MONTEROSATO at from 100 to 200 fathoms' depth, off 

 the coast of Sicily. That it might extend far to the north, would be expected from 

 its capability of bearing the low temperature of 37 Fahr., which prevails over the 

 deep bottom from which it was first brought up ; and this expectation was verified by 

 its presenting itself in one of the "Valorous" dredgings in Baffin's Bay (lat. 62 6' N., 

 depth 1,350 fathoms, temperature 34 6' Fahr.), as well as at two stations in the 

 North Atlantic, No. 12, depth 1,450 fathoms, and No. 13, depth 690 fathoms, both in the 

 parallel of 56. It has been only once brought up, however, in the "Challenger" 

 expedition, viz,, at Station 44, off Cape Hatteras, from a bottom of 1,700 fathoms' 

 depth, over which creeps (there is strong reason to believe) an underflow of cold water 

 from the Arctic basin. Several specimens have (I am informed) been since found in a 



* " Lectures on Surgical Pathology," 1849 ; Lect. VII. General Considerations on Repair and 

 Reproduction. 



