4926 Notices of New Books. 



any information you may deem useful to us in the formation of our Society, and 

 mention our intention to any of your friends, you will greatly oblige me. — Henry 

 Edwards ; Merrivale, Merri Merri Creek, near Melbourne, Victoria, July 14, 1855. 



The Vinegar Polype. — I cannot regret having sent so long an extract from Hue's 

 * Travels' relative to the " Tsou-no-dze," as it has elicited remarks from that accurate 

 naturalist, Jonathan Couch, who, on his grand black cliffs at Polperro, allows few 

 denizens of air or sea to escape his observation: he writes to me that he has an 

 opportunity for examining what he supposes to be analogous to the Chinese polype of 

 the Yellow Sea, and that, kept in water not salt, it for some months has furnished a 

 supply of vinegar: he believes it to be a species of Tremella (or Palmella of Harvey), 

 living in water, and at certain periods multiplying by foliations or off-shoots. When 

 he saw the parent plant it was lying in a reddish turbid fluid, having a strong smell of 

 vinegar. He thus describes some of the off-shoots subsequently sent to him : — " When 

 I proceeded to examine the contents of the bottle presented to me, I perceived in it, 

 near the bottom, a disk, which I had no doubt of being one of the so-called plants; 

 and on closer scrutiny I discovered one or two more. I then poured the whole into a 

 bowl, and found no less than four. The largest was about the size of a large break- 

 fast-cup and the thickness of a penny-piece, perfectly circular (although not made so 

 by the containing vessel), and it was so heavy as to fall to the bottom of the fluid in 

 the bowl. The second disk was also circular, of the size of a half-penny and the 

 thickness of a penny. The third was also of the same circumference, but much thicker 

 and cup-shaped — I do not mean hollow or excavated, but resembling a mass of jelly 

 or metal solidified in a cup. The fourth was about the same circumference as the 

 two last named, but perhaps four inches long, and with circular indentations, which 

 made it appear like a number of disks united together. Still, however, they were not 

 evenly united, but, viewed on one side only, bore some resemblance to a slightly cut 

 screw. The skin of the last specimen hung loosely about it, as did that of the large 

 original specimen when I inspected it. It appeared to me that this pellicle ought to 

 be removed, but as yet I have not ventured to do it." This account seems to withdraw 

 the so-called "polype" from the domain of Zoology, in which Hue had placed its 

 congener, but its power of continuously secreting acid, when immersed in a bowl of 

 water, appears to be a novelty in vegetable organisms, and it is a mystery whence it 

 can procure carbon sufficient to form vinegar, when the supply of available carbonic 

 acid gas must be very small. — Charles Fox ; Trebah, near Falmouth, October 10, 1855. 



NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 



' Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science, including the Trans- 

 actions of the Microscopical Society of London? Edited by 

 Edwin Lankestkr, M.D., F.R.S., F.L.S., and George Busk, 

 F.R.C.S.E., F.R.S., F.L.S. London : Highley. No. XII., 

 dated July, 1855; price 4s. 

 The contents of the July number are as under : — 

 1 Observations on Cosmariura margaritiferura and other Desuiidiea?.' 

 By Mrs. Herbert Thomas, of Bristol. 



