360 Zoological Society : — 



molecules of Brown, are commonly seen, and have been thought by 

 many to be reproductive organs. 



Iii conclusion, the author adverted to the intimate resemblance 

 which existed between the organisms of the animal and vegetable 

 kingdoms at these parts of their scales respectively, insomuch that 

 they would appear to diverge from one common point, at which 

 would stand a being neither vegetable nor animal. Spongilla ap- 

 peared very near this. The author had found that this organism, 

 towards the end of the dry season, developes almost as much starch 

 as plants, yet there is not a particle of starch to be found in the 

 composition of its capsule and ovules. It subsists on nutrition 

 brought into its cell through endosmosis, yet there is no trace of 

 cellulose in its cell-wall. It is endowed with polymorphism ; but 

 the protoplasm of the cell in many plants, to say nothing of Algae, 

 has as much, though it cannot move beyond the cellulose covering 

 in which it is incarcerated any more than the sponge-cell while the 

 latter is enclosed en masse within the general pellicula. It is true 

 that it possesses the vesicula, but Cohn has shown that this exists in 

 even some of the swarm-cells of Confervce. It is not impossible, 

 from the great })larality of the vesicnlce in the Rhizopoda (iu which 

 class Spongilla should be included) and the activity mth which they 

 perform their ))eculiar function, that the excretory currents of the 

 canals should be thus produced. Mr. Bowerbank had discovered 

 cilia on them to assist in this office, but zoospores move about by the 

 aid of cilia, and in the spore or macrogonidium of CEdoffoniujn 

 these are very numerous. The graiiules of Spongilla contain a yel- 

 low colouring material, like endochrome, and when Spoiigilla becomes 

 green, it appears to be caused by a deepening of this colour. So that 

 after all, the difference between the lower organisms of the animal 

 and vegetable kingdoms becomes so slight, that, as Niigeli and Cohn 

 have observed, chemical reagents alone can determine the point j and 

 even then, the transition, in some of them, of one vital product into 

 another during the cycle of their existence, makes them, according 

 to this test, at one time a vegetable and at another time animal ; 

 until, it seems, that there must be a point at which both are equally 

 combined. 



ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



January 23, 1855. — Dr. Gray, F.R.S., Vice-President, iu the Chair. 



Characters of six new species of the genus Thamno- 

 PHiLUS. By Philip Lutley Sclater, M.A. 



1. Thamnophilus transandeanus. 



Supra niger ; subtus albus ; tectricibus alarum superioribus et 

 caudce inferioribus nigris albo terminatis ; cauda nigra rectri- 

 cibus duabus utrinque extimis macula parvu terminali alba. 



Long, tota 8*1, alae 3-/, caudse 3-2 poll. 



Hab. iu rep. Equatoriana, Guyaquil. Mus. Brit. 



Obs. Similis Thamaophilo majori, sed tectricibus subcaudalibus 

 nigris albo terrninatis et rectricibus non albo guttatis. 



