278 Dr. W. B. Carpenter on the 



But that the readers of Mr. Carter's letter may form a right 

 estimate of the value of his pronunctamento, they ought to be 

 aware of the following facts : — 



1. Mr. Carter, as I learn from himself, has not read any 

 thing that has been written upon the opposite side of the 

 question. 



2. Mr. Carter's ideas of Foraminiferal structure are based, 

 not upon a comprehensive survey of the entire group, but upon 

 that of the small number of types he has himself examined. 

 This is clear from the fact that his definitions (pp. 191, 192) 

 apply only to a certain section of the Vitreous or " perforate " 

 Order, and exclude the Porcellanous and the Arenaceous 

 Orders — the first of them uniformly " imperforate," the second 

 generally so. 



3. Mr. Carter's knowledge of Eozoon is avowedly confined 

 to that which he has derived from the examination of the spe- 

 cimens sent to him by Prof. King. If he had asked me to 

 show him the chief results I obtained from a study of the large 

 mass of material put into my hands by Sir Wm. Logan, 

 which occupied nearly my whole time (during slow conva- 

 lescence from a severe illness) for a space of two months, I 

 should have most gladly done so ; and I feel sure that I should 

 at any rate have demonstrated to him that there is a great 

 deal more to be said in favour of the Foraminiferal nature of 

 Eozoon than he has at present any idea of. 



Hence Mr. Carter's affirmation, that the opinion of those 

 from whom he differs on this question has no other basis than 

 " the wildest conjecture," and his imputation to them of inca- 

 pacity to distinguish things as different from each other " as 

 the legs of a table are from the legs of a quadruped," are to 

 be considered simply as specimens of a new method and lan- 

 guage, which, after Prof. Huxley *, I may term Carterese. 

 Whether its general adoption will be good for the progress of 

 Science, may be an open question : I will give an example of 

 its application. 



Geologists who have worked over the Greensand near Cam- 

 bridge, have met with spherical bodies varying from the size 

 of a marble to that of a small cricket-ball ; which, I learn from 

 Prof. Eamsay, they were accustomed to kick about as inor- 

 ganic concretions, without the smallest idea of their organic 

 origin. The discovery by Prof. Morris, however, of a non- 

 infiltrated specimen, led me to examine the internal structure 

 of these solid balls ; and this examination brought me to the 

 knowledge of the entirely new and, in many particulars, ano- 



* "To call a man an Atheist, in Recordese, simply means that you 

 don't agree with him." 



