Mr. Westwood's Obsei'vations, S^'c. 225 



" cissimi omnium mortalium Chinenses noverunt, qui ilia oryzae miscent, 

 *' ut liquorem suum destillatitium (quem Arac nos hie vocamus) tanto 

 " calidius reddant, pernicioso invento, quod hinc miseri nostri socii na- 

 " vales, sanguinis sputum, Pthisin, Marasmum denique, et ipsam tan- 

 " dem mortem incurrant." This is rather hard upon the Argonauts, as 

 well as the Socii Navales. The worthy Bontius seems to have been par- 

 ticularly unlucky in his fishing for the cephalopoda. Speaking of the 

 cuttle-fish, and its power of ejecting an inky fluid, he, with great naivete 

 says, " Quod adeo in me ipso expertus sum : dum enim Sepiam curio- 

 " sius contemplaier, effuso illo Pliniano atramento suo totam faciem mihi 

 " infuscavit, non sine risu astantium." 



Art. XXVI. Observations upon the Genus Scaphura, K, 

 with Descriptions of two new Species, By J. O. Wksi - 

 WOOD, F.L.S., 8fc. 



Amongst the most interesting of the various and contradictory opi- 

 nions of naturalists of the present day, with regard to questions connected 

 with natural science, may be ranked those which relate to the existence 

 or non-existence of isolated groups of objects, of higher or lower rank ; 

 in other words, First, Whether every object in nature is not referable to 

 some group or collection of objects of a similar structure, entirely sepa- 

 rated and distingushed from all other groups ; or, Secondhj, Whether 

 such groups are not, although so insulated, connected with each other by 

 means of intervening and generally smaller groups, which, although par- 

 taking of the characters of the groups between which they intervene evi- 

 dently possess characters peculiarly their owm, and sufficient to shew that 

 they cannot be inserted in the groups they connect, and therefore are 

 themselves insulated ;* or. Lastly, Whether the great chain of nature is 



* With reference to this plan it may be remarked, that the admission of the 

 existence of osculant genera tends to establish it as the plan of the creation. 



