466 Notes and Memoranda. 



NOTES AND MEMORANDA. 



The Avceban Rhizopops.— Dr. Wallich continues, with amazing patience, hia 

 elaborate study of amoeban rhizopods, and we extract a few facts and opinions from 

 his last paper in the Annals of Natural History. He has, amongst other things, 

 ascertained that the amoebae can, at least temporarily, assume the form of actino- 

 phrys. He points out three modes by which new amoebae ai'e formed by acts of 

 re-production. — 1. The extrusion from the parent of a minute but perfect offspring. 

 2. Development from one of the sarcoblasts, or acapsular masses which are 

 formed within the parent previous to, or during, ency station. 3. By development 

 from each granule of the acapsular nuclear mass, on the disruption of the latter. 

 He considers these creatures .'hermaphrodite, and that the preceding generative 

 acts are distinct from the multiplication of the individual, or vegetative repetition 

 of the species by fission or germination, which last process he does not vouch for on 

 his own authority, except as regards actinophrys. He shows that sarcoblasts of 

 the amoeba?, which are very small, do manage to get into frustules of diatoms, and 

 he thinks they may get into confervae, and undergo a development which has 

 hitherto been misunderstood. He likewise proves that these sarcoblasts preserve 

 their vitality under prolonged desiccation. 



Electricity and Asthma. — M. Poggioli desci-ibes to the French Academy 

 the success which he experienced in treating asthma by electricity. He considers 

 this remedy applicable to true asthma only, which is a nervous disorder of the 

 respiratory apparatus, usually occurring periodically and in paroxysms, and not to 

 asthmatic symptoms resulting from heart disease or pulmonary emphysema. 



Effects oe Consanguineous Maeeiages.— M. Bailey has called the atten- 

 tion of the French Academy to a remarkable result of a very singular marriage of 

 this kind. He says, " the father and mother enjoyed good health ; the father was 

 born in lawful wedlock ; the mother, somewhat older, came from a foundling 

 hospital. From this union resulted in succession four infants, stillborn ; the fifth 

 is deaf and dumb in an asylum at Rome ; the sixth is a dwarf, and the seventh 

 has not at present exhibited any peculiarity. It is now known that the indivi- 

 duals, so afflicted in their descendants, are brother and sister, children of the same 

 father and mother. The girl, born before marriage, was deserted by her parents, 

 was never reclaimed by them, and was ignorant who they were." M. Bailey 

 proposes that special inquiries should be made in deaf and dumb asylums concern- 

 ing the relationship of the parents of the unfortunates. In Borne he finds out of 

 thirteen cases of persons born deaf and dumb, three were offspring of consan- 

 guineous marriages, one being connected with the deplorable story we have just 

 cited. 



An Aetieiciai Tongue. — M. Maisonneuve, Surgeon of the Hotel Dieu, de- 

 scribes in Cosmos how he removed from a patient the whole of a tongue afflicted 

 with cancer, by means of which he terms cauterization en Jleches. He perforated 

 the tongue with eight of his cauterizing arrows (Jleches), so as to cause all the 

 affected portions to slough off in one mass. His patient, after the removal of the 

 tongue, could neither swallow nor speak, but performed both thoso functions on 

 being supplied with a gutta-percha tonguo of the natural size. 



Spontaneous Generation Controversy. — The dispute between M. Pas- 

 teur, on one side, andM.M. Pouchet, Joly, Musset, and other heterogenists, on the 

 Other, still rages in the French Academy. The latter bring air from tho Alps in 

 Li. tiles, ami lind it capable of giving rise to infusoria in solutions that have been 

 boiled. The former admits that portions of air from Alpino summits occasionally 

 contain germs, as proved by his own experiments, and he points out precautions 

 that mtiii to have Uen neglected by his antagonists. The balance of experimental 

 accuracy seems decidedly with M. Pasteur, but tho continuance of the discussion 

 cannot tail to enlarge our knowledge of tho conditions under which infusoria 

 appear. M. Blourens proposed and the Academy agreed to appoint a commission 



before which the heterogenists should bo requested In repeat tho experiments by 

 which they think they invaliduto M. Pasteur's conclusions. 



