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more difficult Grerman. There is another interesting monograph 
on the Spongilla (also subsequent to my memoirs) by Laurent, 
entitled Eecherches sur THydre et I’Eponge d’Eau Douce,” 
Paris, 1844, with a folio atlas of beautifully coloured plates, 
which Professor Williamson is probably unacquainted with. 
Of the four constituent elements in the organisation of the 
Spongilla^ I will here only further observe on the thirds or the 
‘^seed-like bodies.” This term I gave to them in 1838 ; they 
are synonymous with Sporangien,” or sporidia,” — the 
semina lentiformia ” of Linnaeus, the “ Korner ” of Oken, the 
“semences” of Lamouroux, the “granules” of Dr. Oray, the 
“ eggs ” or “ ova,” “ ovaria,” the “ corps oviformes ’ of Dutro- 
chet, the “ ovules ” and “ spherules ” of others. I believe Dr. 
J. E. Gray was the first to show the germinating nature of 
these “ granules, which he squeezed from the fresh Spongilla, 
and which formed a velvety mass through which visible fibres 
were shooting and gradually growing.”* The like appearances 
were noticed by me in March 1838, and on Dec. 18 of that 
year, I exhibited at a meeting of the Linnsean Society some 
specimens of the yellow seed-like bodies, which I had kept in a 
glass vessel, and every one of them was covered with a white 
woolly substance which showed distinct cells or pores, as well as 
minute fibres or spicula. The reader will see in the Lin. 
Trans, p. 366, this account, and also fuller and more decided 
proofs of a repetition of the same experiment at p. 373, and 
which Dr. Johnston considered f as “leaving no doubt of the 
truly seminal (or reproductive) character of the sphaerulse.” 
Professor Williamson has represented these seed-like bodies in 
Plate XX. figs. 2, 7, 8, 12 : fig. 7 being a single one magnified ; 
this well shows the small dots, or short papillae, covering the 
outer shell, and the central dimple, “which by desiccation con- 
tracts and becomes somewhat drawn in,” and also its orifice. 
This last is called hilum (fig. 7, a), a scar, by the author, and 
likewise by Link and Kaspail ; although Grervais correctly thinks 
that it is not so, since the body itself has no pedicle or funicu- 
lum. Besides these numerous fixed seed-like bodies there are 
other reproductive minute corpuscules, which I have called the 
“ locomotive gemmules ” or “sporules.” I first noticed these 
germ-like bodies on Aug. 12, 1838, and they appeared to me to 
he similar to what Dr. G-rant, in 1826, terms the “ova ” of sea 
sponges, which he had noticed as “swimming”| and gliding with 
regular motions ; and which M. Dutrochet describes as “ les 
ceufs de I’eponge, animes de mouvemens spontanes comme des 
* See “ Zool. Journal,” vol. i. p. 50, 1824. 
t Johnston’s British Sponges,” p. 551, 1842. 
X For this account, consult Lin. Trans, vol. xviii. p. 379. 
