582 
DE. CAEPENTEE’S EESEAECHES ON THE FOEAidINTFEEA. 
tion in this group is not confined to the present epoch, but that it is true also of the 
Foraminiferous fauna of all the geological periods to which their researches have 
extended. “ Our own experience of the wide limits within which any specific group of 
the Foraminifera multiply their varietal forms, related by some peculiar conditions of 
growth and ornamentation, has led us to concur fully with those who regard nearly 
every species of Foraminifera as capable of adapting itself, r\ith endless modifications of 
form and structure, to very difierent habitats — in brackish and in salt water, — in the 
several zones of shallow and abyssal seas, — and under every climate, from the Poles to 
the Equator. In arranging our synoptical tables of the Mediterranean Ehizopoda, recent 
and fossil, and in comparing their numerous specific and varietal forms one with another, 
we have not confined ourselves to our collections from this region, but have necessarily 
made comparisons of forms from almost every part of the globe, from the Ai'ctic and 
the Tropic Seas, from the temperate zones of both hemispheres, and from shallow as 
well as deep-sea beds. Geologically, also, we have reriewed the Foraminifera in then- 
manifold aspects, as presented by the ancient Faunas of the Tertiary, Ci-etaceous, Oolitic. 
Liassic, Triassic, Permian, and Carboniferous times ; finding, to our astonishment, that 
scarcely any of tlie species of the Foraminifera met with in the Secondary rocks have 
become extinct ; all, indeed, that we have yet seen have their counterparts in the recent 
Mediterranean deposits. This is still more clearly found to be the case with regard to 
the Chalk of Maestricht and the Tertiaries*.” 
258. The same excellent observers, in summing up their description of the Forami- 
nifera of the blue clay met with in the alabaster pits at Chellaston near Derby, 
belonging to the Upper Triassic series, thus express themselves: — ‘-Having thus 
pointed out that, judging from these specimens obtained at Chellaston, the minute 
Nodosarinw and other Foraminifera of the Triassic period have continued to exist 
through the intermediate ages to the present day without losing any of their essentially 
specific features, we will observe that the Nodosarice are present in rocks of still greater 
age than the Trias, — namely, the Permian and Carboniferous, and probably even the 
Lower Silurian. Nodosari(E and Dentalince abound in some of the Permian limestones 
of Durham and the Wetterau in company with Tcxtiilarm\ jS'odosaria occurs also in 
the Carboniferous Limestone of Ireland, according to M‘Coy ; and the green sand of the 
Lower Silurian series near St. Petersburg has granted to Ehrexeerg casts of chambers 
something like those of Dentalina, together with unmistakeable casts of Textularian and 
Eotalian shells. We may remark, too, that the Fusulina of the Eussian, North American, 
and Arctic Mountain limestone carries back the pedigree of t\\e Xonionina group to the 
palaeozoic periods, and that it is accompanied with other Foraminifera of knoum types, 
among which Nummulina is not absent. This last-named type has rare representatives 
in the Lias and Oolite ; it acquired great potency in the Tertiary seas, and is not extinct 
now. — Altogether we have here some remarkable instances of the persistency of life- 
types among the lower animals. Though the specific relations of the Palaeozoic Forami- 
* Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, August ISGO, p. 294. 
