NUMMULITE. 
.385 
siphuncle.* The form of the essential parts 
varies in each species of this genus, but their 
principles of construction, and manner of opera- 
hon, appear in all to have been the same. 
The remains of Nummulites are not the only 
animal bodies which have contributed to form 
^be calcareous strata of the crust of the earth ; 
ather, and more minute species of Chambered 
abells have also produced great, and most sur- 
prising effects. Lamarck (Note, v. 7. p, 611), 
'Speaking of the Miliola, a small multilocular 
®bell, no larger than a millet seed, with which 
the strata of many quarries in the neighbourhopd 
af Paris are largely interspersed, notices the 
important influence which these minute bodies 
have exercised by reason of their numerical 
abundance. We scarcely condescend, says he, 
to examine microscopic shells, from their insig- 
nificant size ; but we cease to think them insig- 
nificant, when M'e reflect that it is by means of 
the smallest objects, that Nature every where 
produces her most remarkable and astonishing 
phenomena. Whatever she may seem to lose 
in point of volume in the production of living 
bodies, is amply made up by the number of the 
individuals, which she multiplies with admirable 
In PI. 44 ^ Figs. 6, 7, sections of two species of Nummulite 
copied from Parkinson. These show the manner in which 
whorls are coiled up round each other, and divided by oblique 
septa. ' ^ 
G. 
C C 
