204? Mr. W. S. MacLeay on the Dying Struggle 



Our critic talks a great deal about lampreys and leeches, 

 about the former having eyes and the latter none, with many 

 more observations of similar novelty and to much the same 

 purpose. He must excuse me, but I really have neither 

 time nor inclination to notice them*. I only entreat him 

 to recollect that the transition from Vertebrata to Annelida 

 is not made directly by the eyed lamprey, but by a blind animal 

 called Myxine glutinosaf, of which the last naturalist that has 

 described it says, " Voisins des Lamproies par les Ammoccetes, 

 auxquels ils ressemblent beaucoup, et avec lesquels ils forment 

 un passage tres naturel de la classe des Poissons a celle des 

 Annelides." The whole article, which is by Bory de St. Vin- 

 cent, in the Dictionnaire Classique d'Histoire Naturelle, de- 

 serves to be read, as it details the grounds of the above affi- 

 nity. Cuvier had already pointed out the same self-evident 

 fact ; yet here is a writer saying " that he is astonished that 

 any individual who ever made the comparison should have 

 been able to perceive very evident affinities where there ex- 

 isted only a few very remote and insignificant analogies." I 

 repeat it, and I have proved it, that he does not know an affi- 

 nity from an analogy. 



Now the foregoing demonstrated affinities are his chosen 

 points of attack, his fancied mortal stabs. Valeant quantum 

 valere possint, and I find myself still safe on my legs. To be 

 sure the tender-hearted gentleman knows more vulnerable 

 points, but he thinks it is useless to be cruel. " In connecting 

 the other circles, defects equally remarkable and extensive 

 might be pointed out, were it necessary to enlarge." Equally 

 remarkable and equally extensive I trust they would be — I 

 want no better. 



He says that the quinarian circle, like the tripod of the 

 Isle of Man, " stabit quocunque jeceris." So far as relates to 

 the stability of the system, no doubt the remark is perfectly 

 correct; but the Doctor is I suspect here awkwardly alluding 



* I suspect, however, that SirEverard Home will scarcely feel ohliged to 

 him for citing his authority on a point which has long since been disproved 

 by the celebrated French anatomists MM. Majendie and Desmoulins. His 

 admiration of Sir Everard's discovery of the hermaphroditisms of the lam- 

 prey, induced him to institute the genus Homea in his honour; although it 

 ought clearly to be called Gastrobranchns, the original fish described pre- 

 serving the generic name Myxine given to it by Linnaeus. In this way 

 Bloch's very appropriate name would not be lost. It is truly unfortunate 

 that the above denial of any affinity between Vertebrata and Annidosa not 

 only proves our Doctor never to have seen his " Homea," which he only 

 knows by Sir Everard's description, but that even to this day he remains 

 in ignorance of the most important point of its structure. 



f See Horce Entomologicce, p. 203. 



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