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XX. Contributions to the Knowledge of the Foraminifera.—On the Rhizopodal Fauna 
of the Shetlands. By Henny B. Bramy, FLAS. 
(Plate XLVIII.) 
‘Read February 18th, 1864. 
BUT little addition has been made to our knowledge of the British marine Rhizopodal 
fauna since the publication by the Ray Society in 1858 of Professor Williamson's Mono- 
graph on the Recent Foraminifera of Great Britain. This careful and excellent work 
must be looked upon as the starting-point of systematic labour on the subject, rather 
than as an exhaustive history of the organisms of which it treats. In it there are col- 
lected together many of the fragmentary notices of Foraminifera which occur in the 
works of the earlier British naturalists, with collateral references to the writings of 
Continental authors but little known here. An effort is conspicuous throughout the 
volume towards a reduction of the number of species and genera, so large a proportion of 
which had previously been determined on trivial and unimportant characters; and the 
groundwork of our knowledge of their distribution in our seas is laid in the careful list 
of localities appended to the description of each species. The beautiful plates with which 
the work is illustrated were the first series published in this country of any value to the 
working naturalist, and are of great practical use as a standard of reference. | 
Further research, with the advantage of such a groundwork, naturally yields rapid 
additions to our store of facts. The examination of sands from depths not before dredged, 
or localities not previously visited, brings to light species new to our coast, and shows 
the wider distribution of those already known. 
Since the publication of the * Monograph’ the nomenclature of the entire group has 
undergone considerable change, due to its laborious revision by Messrs. Parker and Jones ; 
and Dr. Carpenter's * Introduction to the Study of the Foraminifera,' written with the con- 
currence and assistance of the before-named naturalists, has unfolded a system of classi- 
fieation which, though involving many difficulties, is the only one hitherto proposed 
possessing a natural and at the same time an obviously scientific basis. Thus it will be 
seen that the facilities for the study of these organisms are now very different from those 
Which existed a few years ago, and the altered state of our knowledge of the Protozoa 
generally will explain many points in which the course of the following paper differs 
from that pursued in Professor Williamson's work. 
During the past few years I have had the opportunity, through the kindness of several 
naturalist friends, of examining large quantities of material from various portions of qun 
coast, both littoral sands and those dredged from deep water, with respect to the microzoa. 
Contained in them ; and 1 propose in the present paper to give the results of a careful: 
vestigation of a series of dredgings obtained from the Shetland Islands in tho summer 
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