LATTICE WORKERS, OR POLYCYSTINA. 73 



Assuming, then, that the skeletons of the animals 

 called PolycystinSy which are found in various deposits 

 as fossils, as well as in the mud of the ocean at, the 

 present day, are minute siliceous, or flinty, objects of 

 very variable shape, perforated for the most part with 

 numerous openings, as variable as the contour of the 

 skeleton, and that these skeletons are sometimes 

 symmetrical and sometimes not, it will now be our 

 object to clothe these skeletons, and ascertain what 

 is known of the living animal which constructed these 

 glass houses, or flinty tenements, in which they dwelt- 

 In this instance, as in some others in the present 

 volume, we accept the term sarcode as the represen- 

 tative of the simple, glairy, gelatinous flesh of the 

 animal, however modified, but in order to avoid con- 

 founding this substance with flesh, as we understand 

 and recognise it in the higher animals, it is better to 

 employ a different term, and we have it at hand, as 

 already adopted and recognised, in sarcode. 



There is much in common in this respect between 

 the Foraminifers and the Polycystins, for Dr. Wallich, 

 observes : " I believe that between the degree of 

 differentiation of the sarcode body observable in the 

 Foraminifera, and the Polycystina, no difference of im- 

 portance really exists. In both families the pseudo- 



1 " On the Structure and Affinities of the Polycystina," by 

 G. C. Wallich, M.D., in Quart. Journ. Microscopic Science 

 v. p. 67. 1865. 



