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The lecturer began by an apology for his appearance before the 

 Society to treat of such a peculiarly scientific subject. He remem- 

 bered the classic maxim, " Ne sutor ultra crepidam." He did not, 

 however, appear there as a scientific lecturer at all. He came 

 before them simply as a member of their Society, to give, in a 

 popular way, the result of a few leisure hours devoted to the study 

 of his subject. It was a subject of considerable interest and im- 

 portance. His audience were all acquainted with it in a practical 

 way. The Sponge of commerce had become a necessity of civilised 

 life. The trade between these countries and the Mediterranean 

 in Sponges alone was something very considerable. The Island 

 of Rhodes contributed, perhaps, more than any other place to this 

 trade. But on this branch of the subject the lecturer would refer 

 them to an excellent paper of Mr. Patterson's in the " Popular 

 Science Review." He had to do that evening with the nature of 

 of the thing itself. What is a Sponge ? Now, to answer this 

 question was not easily determined. From Aristotle and Pliny 

 down to our modern naturalists various answers had been given. 

 Is it animal or vegetable ? Linnaeus has classed it first among 

 the Algae, and finally among the Zoophytes. Even Owen was at 

 first uncertain about its place in the organic world. It remained 

 to Johnston (1842), and to his successor, Dr. Bowerbank, to settle 

 this vexed question. It was now universally admitted that Sponges 

 are animals. The next thing to do was to settle their place in the 

 animal kingdom. This was a very low one. They stand, according 

 to Professor Huxley, just immediately above the Infusoria, the last 

 division in the Linnaean sub-kingdom of Radiata. Dr. Ray Greene 

 had adopted a somewhat different classification of the lower groups. 

 He had separated two classes from the Radiata, to which he had 

 given the names of Ccelenterata and Protozoa. Under the last- 

 named division — the lowest in the animal kingdom — he placed the 

 Spongiadae. This class was to be distinguished from the Grega- 

 rinidae, or Gregarian Polyps. The latter, as their name implied, 

 lived in groups together. Their common habitation, composed 

 generally of carbonate of lime, resembled somewhat the skeleton 

 of the Sponge in structure. The corals and corallines were poly- 

 pidums of the Gregarinidae. Every division here was the habitation 



