SPONGES. $55 



real nature thus completely ascertained j and from subsequent ob- 

 servations it was found that the animals of most of the coral tribes* 

 both hard and soft, were strongly allied to polypes, and were endow- 

 ed with the same re-productive properties; while others were pos- 

 sessed of the same power, but seemed more allied to the actiniae, or 

 sea-anemonies, and to the medusae, or sea-blubbers. Afterwards 

 the celebrated Mr. Ellis, by repeated observations made about the 

 British coasts, proved beyond all doubt, that the smaller corals, 

 commonly known by the name of coralines, or sea-mosses, were ac- 

 tually so many ramified sea-polypes, covered with a kind of strong, 

 horny case, to defend them from the injuries to which they would 

 otherwise be liable, in the boisterous element in which they are des- 

 tined to reside. 



Mr. Ellis's observations on the harder, or stonv corals, as well as 

 the observations of many other philosophers, have at length proved 

 also that these stony corals are equally of an animal nature ; the 

 whole coral continuing to grow as an animal, and to form by secre- 

 tion, the strong or horny part of the coral, which at once may be 

 considered as its bone and its habitation, which it has no power of 

 leaving, and a coral of this kind is therefore a large compound 

 zoophyte. 



[Shaw, 



Sponges afford us another curious proof of zoophytic life ; each 

 of which is characterised in the Linnaean system as a fixed animal, 

 flexile, torpid, of various forms, composed either of reticulate fibres, 

 or masses of small spines interwoven together, and clothed with a 

 gelatinous flesh, full of small mouths on its surface, by which it 

 absorbs and rejects water. 



After having been regarded at different periods as an organized 

 living substance, of a doubtful kind ; then as an inorganized sub- 

 stance ; then as a vegetable ; sponge is now advanced to the animal 

 kingdom, and usually classed as we have arranged it above. So 

 early as the days of Aristotle, it was noticed by the persons employ- 

 ed in collecting it, to shrink back wheu torn from the rocks, and was 

 hence supposed to be in some way or other possessed of animal sensa- 

 tion : and this opinion, prevalent in the time of Aristotle, was still 

 prevalent in that of Pliny. For many ages afterwards, however, 

 these naturalists appear to have been regarded as mistaken upon this 



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