Miscellaneous. 319 



tions of that Society), that I have detected coccoliths in abundance, 

 and retaining their normal characters, in some of the fossil siliceous 

 earths of Barbadoes &c., and that coccospheres have been met 

 with by me profusely in a living, or perhaps it would be more safe 

 to say, a recent condition, in material collected at the surface of the 

 open seas of the trop"cs, and also in dredgings from shoal water ob- 

 tained off the south coast of England. 



It only remains for me to add that, so far as the chemical nature 

 of these bodies can be ascertained by reagents and the polariscope, 

 there is reason to believe that carbonate of lime enters largely into 

 their comj)osition ; and they furnish us with another striking ex- 

 ample, in which simphcity of structure has enabled an organism to 

 weather the vicissitudes to which the surface of the globe has been 

 subject, and under the operation of which more complex forms have 

 ceased to exist. — Athenceum for Sept. 19, 1868. 



Transporting Fish alive. 



Mr. Moore, the Curator of the Liverpool Free Museum, has suc- 

 ceeded in importing some living fish from the Hiver Plate, the first 

 live fish that he has received from the south of the equator. Some 

 English fish sent out by the same captain arrived safely ; and he 

 left Liverpool on the 11th of this month with another series offish. 

 They were sent out and imported in a common fish-globe suspended 

 like a cabin-lamp, in gimbals. 



There are now exhibited in the Liverpool Museum two catfish, 

 three pomotis, two species of Cyprinus, fonr axolotls, and a Proteus 

 that were imported from New York by the same method. — J. E. 

 Gbay. 



On Tetilla euplocamos and Hyalonema boreale. 

 By Dr. J. E. Gray, F.R.S. &c. 



It is a curious coincidence that three smaU-peduncled capitate 

 sponges should be discovered about the same time, viz. : — 



1. Hyalonema horeale, Loven, from the North Sea. 



2. Lovenia horeale of Bocage, coast of Portugal. 



3. Tetilla euplocamos, Oscar Schmidt, Spongien von Algier, t. 5. f . 1 0, 

 from Brazil. 



There can be no doubt that they are all distinct species ; and the 

 spicules show that the North- Sea and Portuguese species must be 

 referred, according to my views, to different families — the one to 

 Halichondriadae and the other to Tethyadse. Unfortunately Tetilla 

 is not regularly described by Dr. Oscar Schmidt. 



It is curious that Dr. 0. Schmidt, like Dr. Loven and M. Bocage, 

 compares the small-peduncled sponge to Hyalonema. The Tetilla 

 was sent to him from Brazil by M. F. MiiUer. He observes, *' The 

 pear-shaped body is like Tethya, |and the peduncle is like Hyalo- 

 nema ; the body is formed of clustered spicules with abundance of 

 thrice-forked spicules, the forks projecting, and covering the surface 



