440 Miscellaneous. 
combined form by the tissues which prepare venous blood. This 
fact also leads to certain conclusions as to the manner in which the 
carbonic acid is combined in the blood and expelled by the corpuscles. 
When the blood is completely deprived of gas, a portion of its 
disks is decomposed into a colourless stroma and a coloured fluid. 
The same phenomenon is observed, although in a less degree, when 
only the oxygen is removed from the blood, whether by pumping 
or by suffocation. On the other hand, the attempt to render the 
blood perfectly free from carbonic acid by the introduction of 
oxygen was unsuccessful, Even after the long-continued action of 
air containing oxygen, but free from carbonic acid, about 4 volumes 
per cent. of carbonic acid always remain, and these can only be got 
rid of after the removal of the oxygen. Blood so treated showed no 
changed corpuscles.—Sitzungsber. der kais. Akad. der Wiss. in 
Wien, 8 January, 1864, p. 3. 
. New Forms of Mollusks ?” 
To the Editors of the Annals and Magazine of Natural History. 
GENTLEMEN,—May I be permitted, as a constant reader of your 
excellent Magazine, to record my humble protest against the un- 
scientific practice (now very much on the increase) of describing, in 
portentous detail, varieties of well-known species of shells as ‘“‘ New 
Forms of Mollusks?”’? I ought not, perhaps, to cavil at Dr. P. P. 
Carpenter giving the new name of Callista pollicaris to a shell which 
I had minutely examined and declared to be a variety of Dione prora 
(Callista prora, Carpenter), because it involves a question of opinion; 
but I may be allowed to object to his printing, as a statement of my 
views, a hasty coriversational concurrence with an opinion to which, 
when I came to print my monograph, I refrained from giving pub- 
licity. What can be the object of describing as a new species a shell 
which the describer, in the same sentence, denotes as being probably 
not a new species? Dr. P. P. Carpenter brought me some shells, 
showing that he had named them Callista puella. I told him that 
they were simply varieties of Dione pannosa (Callista pannosa, Car- 
penter). But his name of puella was not then published : it appears 
in your last Number (p. 312), printed thus :—‘ Callista (? pannosa) 
puella.” Dr. P. P. Carpenter gives the shell a new name while at 
the same time denoting his fear that it may be a variety of one 
named already ; and he goes on to remark, with reference to some 
white specimens of it, ‘The colourless subtrigonal shells were re- 
garded by Mr. Reeve as a separate species, but he did not allude to 
them in his monograph.” The reason of my not alluding to them 
is obvious. Should even the soft parts of the shells under considera- 
tion ever come into Dr. P. P. Carpenter’s hands, I venture to predict 
that he will find difficulty in showing them to be ‘“‘ New Forms of 
Mollusks.”’ I am, Gentlemen, 
Your obedient Servant, 
Sutton, Hounslow, Love.u REEVE, 
April 7, 1863. 
‘ 
ee ae 
