162 Dr. J. E. Gray on the Arrangement 
Continent, and in this and in many other pancuee it is most 
unsatisfactory.” The author of the ‘ British Sponges’ is 
himself partly to blame for this misconception. Though the 
writer above referred to places ‘‘ Bowerbank”’ after each generic 
name (as he does after almost every specific name), he does 
not refer to his paper in the ‘ Philosophical Transactions’ for 
1862, in which they were first defined and published. In- 
deed I believe that many possessors of the ‘ British Sponges’ 
have no idea that the first volume at least is only a reprint 
of the papers in the ‘ Philosophical Transactions,’ with inferior 
copies of the plates; and therefore they may be easily misled so 
as to believe that the genera date only from the issue of that 
work. : 
Dr. Bowerbank’s work is a rich mine of observation ; and it 
is astonishing that a naturalist who has collected so many im- 
portant facts and figured so many spicules should have formed 
such orders and genera, and have described his species in a 
manner so incomprehensible. I believe this chiefly arises from 
his having set himself to work to make an arrangement and 
nomenclature of the spicules which are in his collection of 
microscopic slides, rather than to study the sponges themselves. 
His entire absence of any knowledge of physiology leads him 
into most extraordinary theories about the uses of the spicules 
and the organization of the sponges, which are chiefly pro- 
pounded in his introductory chapter, but equally deform his 
specific descriptions. In fact he undertook a work that required 
considerable scientific acquirements without any preliminary 
training. 
In the ‘ British Sponges’ the spicules are divided into seven 
classes, which are again subdivided and at length separated 
into several hundred kinds, some of them with names long 
enough almost to take away one’s breath to pronounce them 
and most of these are figured. After all this labour, the forms 
of the spicules are never used as generic characters. The 
genera often contain spicules that belong to what he considers 
different classes. Though the differences of the spicules found 
in each species form the principal part of the specific descrip- 
tions, the author does not even think it necessary to refer to 
the figures on his plates which represent the spicules he de- 
scribes—which is to be regretted, as there can be no doubt that 
a reference of this kind would have rendered his descriptions 
more intelligible. In fact the author seems to have collected 
more material than he knew how to employ, like a soldier 
with a great stock of ammunition that he does not know how 
or fears to use. 
In the system of Sponges which I have proposed, certain 
