266 



without any recent animal, with which they could be considered as 

 analogous. 



In the year 1753, Mr. Mylius, in a letter to Haller, described a new 

 kind of zoophyte caught in the North Sea, which somewhat resem- 

 bled the encrinus. Mr. Ellis also, about the same time, obtained 

 another of these animals caught in the same sea*. Some slight agree- 

 ment having been observed between the general form of this animal 

 and that of the lily encrinite, several naturalists were inclined to sup- 

 pose, that the real analogue of the fossil animal was discovered. 

 A very slight degree of attention, however, was necessary to dis- 

 cover, that no real similitude existed between the two animals. It 

 will be sufficient to observe here, that neither the column nor the 

 rays of the recent animal are, like those of the encrinus, articulated; 

 nor do its rays proceed from a regularly formed base, as do those of 

 the fossil animal. Indeed, to the present day, no animal has been dis- 

 covered which can be said to bear the feast analogy with any of the 

 different species of encrinites. 



Various conjectures were also formed, and numerous researches 

 were made, with the hope of discovering the recent analogue of 

 the pentacrinite, but without any success, until Madame de Bois- 

 jourdaine, of Paris, was presented by a friend from Martinique, with 

 a fragment of a new and curious zoophite, which he had received 

 from a captain of a ship, who was unable to say in what sea it had 

 been found. At the death of Mad. Boisjourdaine, this curious spe- 

 cimen came into the possession of Mons. Davila. But it is to Mons. 

 Guettard that we are indebted for having first manifested the relation- 

 ship between it and the peritacrinites. 



This zoophyte appears to be undoubtedly a species of pentacrinus, 

 in its recent state. Like the fossil animal, it is described as possessing 

 an articulated vertebral column, on which is supported a cluster of 



* The Natural History of Coralline, Plate XXXVII. 



