260 NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF DUBLIN. 
Three circumstances seem to render the identity of the form of 
which I have tried to convey an idea by fig. 1, with Pl. spherica some- 
what doubtful. The first is that this latter form is depicted as possess- 
ing linear pseudopodia quite unbranched, whereas our form shows its 
pseudopodia very distinctly, but not indeed very copiously, branched. 
The second point is that the outer covering is represented by Claparéde 
and Lachmann as formed of irregular arenaceous-looking particles, 
whereas in our form the test appears to be formed of certain proble- 
matic linear or bacillar bodies, along with minute indescribable granules 
agglutinated in a single stratum by an intervening, indeed seemingly 
organic, cement into a more or less flexible test. The third point is 
that our animal appears to be notably larger than Claparéde and Lach- 
mann’s. That those observers are silent as to the presence of a nucleus 
may not bear upon the immediate question, because it may have been 
present in their form, though concealed by the opacity of the outer 
covering. 
But it might almost become a further question if any of the three 
forms I figure belong rightly to the genus Pleurophrys, by reason of 
the decidedly branched character of the pseudopodia; for, though no 
absolutely strict distinction can be drawn from pseudopodia in this 
regard, still, as is well known, these in many forms maintain a great 
amount of constancy in their individual character. 
The test not being membranous, but formed of foreign and miscel- 
laneous particles, excludes my three forms from Gromia (Duj.), not to 
speak of the nature of the pseudopodia, which seems to me to be very 
distinct from those characteristic of that genus. Admitting that their 
linear but branched character would be compatible with the genus 
Pleurophrys, they appear to be quite different from the pseudopodia in 
a Gromia by their comparatively rigid nature, and clear, non-granular, 
and tufted shrub-like appearance, without any evident current or reti- 
culated arrangement. They are long, and comparatively straight, clear, 
and silvery, so to say, in appearance, the branches given off more or 
less dichotomously at an acute angle, and do not again appear to inos- 
culate with their neighbours. They alter in appearance, or position, 
or ramification but slowly—the change which, indeed, is speediest of 
accomplishment is that of retraction, leaving the oval body a brown, 
inert, not then readily recognisable mass. All this is quite unlike the 
behaviour of a Gromia, which, when quiet some time upon a slide, 
pours forth an overflow of a clouded, fluid sarcode, which gives off at 
all points irregularly branched prolongations, copiously anastomosing, 
and carrying a vigorous flow of granules in a current, almost like a 
system of vessels. It need not be remarked that the pseudopodia in 
our form are ‘quite a distinct sort of thing from the finger-like, ever- 
fitful pseudopodia of a Difflugia. That these forms, apart from the 
tests, are quite distinct in themselves from Difflugia on the one hand, 
and from Gromia on the other, I could have little doubt; whether they 
rightly fall under Pleurophrys, as I have indicated, may be a question. 
