ANIMALS. 15 
Class FoRAMINIFERA, D’Orbigny.! 
Synonyms. Navutri1 et OrrHocerata, Auct. prior. 
PoLyTHALAMA, CrEpHALoPoDA, Lamarck. 1812. Extrait de son Cours. 
— ve, MunriiocuLa, CepnaLopopa, Latreille. 1825. Fam. nat. du Réegne 
Animal. 
CELLULACEA ET POLYTHALAMACEA, —_ Blainville. 1825. Manuel de Malacol. 
ASIPHONOIDEA, CepHALopopA, De Haan. 1825. Monograph. Ammonit. 
FoRAMINIFERA, — D Orbigny. 1825. Annal. des Sciences nat., tom. vii, 1826." 
— — Cuvier. 1828. Regne Animal., édit. nouv. 
SYMPLECTOMERES, 
RuizopopEs, 
PotytHaLamta, Bryozoa, Ehrenberg. 1838. Abhand. der Akad. Berl. 
Foraminirergs, “entre les Echinoderms et les Polypiers,” D’ Orbigny. 1846. Foraminif. 
} Inrusorres, Dayjardin. 1835. Annal. des Sciences nat., sec. sér. 
foss. Vienne. 
FoRAMINIFERA, “immediately above the Porifera,” Williamson. 1849. Trans. Microscop. 
Soce., vol. ii. 
A group of minute, shelled animals, belonging tothe sub-kingdom Acrita; marine, 
inhabiting sea weeds and the sea bottom; generally free, but sometimes attached to 
shells, corals, &c. 
Animal gelatinous,’ occupying a calcareous shell, which is formed of a succession 
of cells or chambers, arranged in a straight, spiral, or agglomerated manner. The 
cells communicate one with another either by one or more apertures,* or by a narrow 
neck or tube, through which the animal matter is continued from cell to cell.’ The 
cells are either separate from each other, or more or less envelope one another. The 
later cells are progressively larger than the earlier cells. The shell is generally 
perforated with foramina’ for the passage of retractile filaments (pseudopodia). 
The occurrence of Foraminifera in the Permian Formation not having hitherto been 
1 By Mr. T. Rupert Jongs. 
* M. d’Orbigny’s researches in the natural history of this group were commenced in 1819. The paper 
containing his Tableau des Céphalopodes was read in 1825, and published in the Ann. Se. nat. for 1826. 
3 Like the substance of Hydra. The presence of a stomach is doubtful. 
* Hence the appellation ‘‘ Foraminifera.” 
° Each new articulation of the animal being produced by gemmiparous generation from the aperture at 
the extremity of the preceding cell, and each cell being a repetition of the former cells, the character of the 
connexion between the cells is shown by the external orifice of the last cell. 
6 With regard to the perforated appearance of many of the Foraminifera, especially the hyaline species, 
I would observe that the apparent apertures, as shown by transmitted light, are really, when seen by 
reflected light, merely punctations or thinned doubly-concave spaces in the shell. In the investing coats 
of the Nummulite, which appear to be perforated with minute tubules, the separate flakes, when favorably 
mounted, are seen to be imperforate, but bearing innumerable and scarcely-separated transparent spots ; 
and these, when the coats are arranged one on another, are placed in so regular an order from within out- 
wards, that in an oblique section, fine transparent lines resulting therefrom give the whole shell the 
