216 Dr. Wallicli on the Amoeba. 



siderably amplified on the very points whicli call for refu- 

 tation. 



It may be within the recollection of some of the older 

 readers of the ' Annals,' that in 1863 and 1864 a very detailed 

 series of six papers by me, on the Amoeban, Actinophryan, 

 and Difflugian Rhizopods, was published in this Journal; 

 the first of the series, which appeared in April 1863, setting 

 forth the discovery, at Hampstead, of a till then unpublished 

 and publicly unknown form of Amoeba, to which I gave the 

 name of A. villosa. This Amoeba presented some most re- 

 markable characters, and, being found in tolerable abundance, 

 I was enabled to study it very minutely, and thus bring to 

 light a large amount of information concerning the structural 

 and functional characters of the Rhizopods in general that 

 had not been previously available. 



In the summary of Dr. Gruber's second paper (published 

 .in the Journ. Roy. Micr. Soc. for April 1885, pp. 260-61), 

 A. villosa is referred to as " Amoeba villosa, Leidy." This 

 may, of course, be a mere clerical error on Dr. Gruber's part ; 

 but, if not so, it becomes ail the more inexplicable, as Dr. 

 G ruber, in his paper of 1882, makes such special reference to 

 Professor Leidy's magnificent work on ' The Freshwater 

 Rhizopods of North America ' as to indicate that he (Dr. 

 Gruber) was already critically acquainted with its contents. 

 As a matter of fact, Prof. Leidy distinctly and prominently 

 speaks of Amoeba villosa as " a large and remarhable species 

 described by Dr. Wallich and discovered by him in England^ 



Unfortunately, Dr. Gruber's other inaccuracies of statement 

 in reference to the Amoebce do not admit of so ready expla- 

 nation ; for, apart from the obligation every writer on scientific 

 subjects is under of making himself acquainted with the dis- 

 coveries of those who have preceded him in any special line 

 of research, prior to sending forth any views of his own as 

 new and original, it is an unquestionable fact that a full list 

 of all my papers on the Amoeban Rhizopods up to date, 

 together with extracts from the papers themselves on the very, 

 subjects so much more recently dealt with by Dr. Gruber, 

 was to be found in Prof. Leidy's work. But, be that as it 

 may, I shall now proceed to place the facts of the case in a 

 sufficiently clear light to prove beyond question on whicli side 

 priority of observation as well as of publication rests. This 

 I will endeavour to do as briefly as I can compatibly with 

 due justice to Dr. Gruber as well as to myself. But, in a 

 matter of this kind, just conclusions can only be drawn from 

 the actually published records of both parties. I propose 

 therefore to supply, without comment of any sort, first, a 



