502 HISTORY OF PHYSIOLOGY. 



But when an attempt was further made to iden- 

 tify the plan of another branch of the animal world, 

 the mollusca, with that of the vertebrata, the radical 

 opposition between such views and those of Cuvier, 

 broke out into an animated controversy. 



Two French anatomists, MM. Laurencet and 

 Meyranx, presented to the Academy of Sciences, 

 in 1830, a Memoir containing their views on the 

 organization of molluscous animals; and on the sepia 

 or cuttle-fish in particular, as one of the most com- 

 plete examples of such animals. These ^creatures, 

 indeed, though thus placed in the same division with 

 shell-fish of the most defective organization and 

 obscure structure, are far from being scantily organ- 

 ized. They have a brain 4 , often eyes, and these 

 in the animals of this class (cephalopoda) are more 

 complicated than in any vertebrates 5 ; they have 

 sometimes ears, salivary glands, multiple stomachs, 

 a considerable liver, a bile, a complete double circu- 

 lation, provided with auricles and ventricles ; in 

 short, their vital activity is vigorous, and their 

 senses are distinct. 



But still, though this organization, in the abun- 

 dance and diversity of its parts, approaches that of 

 vertebrate animals, it had not been considered as 

 composed in the same manner, or arranged in the 



4 Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire denies this. Principes de Phil. 

 Zoologique discutes en 1830, p. 68. 



5 Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire, Principes de Philosophic Zoologique 

 discutes en 1830, p. 55. 



