182 
DR. CARPENTER’S RESEARCHES ON THE FORAMINIFERA. 
and systematized, must be provisional merely. No general foundation has yet been 
laid for that due appreciation of the value of characters, which, in the case of every 
natural group, must be based on the careful study of its own plan of organization, 
and of the modifications which this may undergo, and which cannot be safely deduced 
by analogy, from the study of any other group, however closely related. Far less 
can any such analogy be truly available, that is drawn from the higher forms of 
Mollusca, and applied to one of those simple types of animal structure, which are 
now commonly included under the general designation Protozoa. 
Having been myself convinced, by the careful examination and extensive com- 
parison which I have had the opportunity of making, as to the external characters 
and internal structure of certain Forarninifera, that neither in regard to the limitation 
of species, nor the association of these into genera, nor the grouping of genera into 
Fa7niUes and Orders, is such an analogy to be in the least degree relied upon, I am 
prepared to show that the whole fabric which has been erected on the basis of it, is 
utterly insecure ; and that every attempt to erect a new classification of the group, 
without a far more intimate knowledge of the anatomical structure and of the physio- 
logieal history of the animals composing it, than has yet been sought for, must neces- 
sarily be premature and therefore unsound. 
If, therefore, notwithstanding the large amount of labour which has been given to 
the study of this group, we are really as yet only at the very commencement of an 
exact acquaintance with it, I venture to think that any contribution towards a more 
intimate knowledge will be welcomed, by all such as consider that systematic arange- 
ments can only be of value, when based on an extensive comparison, not merely of 
the external forms, but of the internal organization, of the objects to be classified, 
and when carried out under the guidance of a competent knowledge of their Physi- 
ology as living beings. It may be well for me here to state, that the greater part of 
the results which I purpose to communicate in successive Memoirs, are based upon 
the examination, not of a limited number of individuals, but of three very extensive 
suites of specimens, which have been liberally placed at my disposal ; the first of these 
series having been formed from the dredgings of Mr. J. Beete Jukes on the coast of 
Australia, into the possession of which I came through the instrumentality of my late 
friend Professor E. Forbes ; the second having been furnished by the collection of 
Forarninifera made by Mr. Hugh Cuming on the shores of the Philippine Islands, 
and unreservedly given up to me by that gentleman for the purposes of scientific 
investigation ; and the third being the admirably-arranged series in the possession of 
my friend Mr. W. K. Parker, who has for several years been patiently and industri- 
ously bringing together from various sources a set of illustrations of this group, which 
in many departments may be safely pronounced to be quite unique. The import- 
ance of the first two of these collections consists, not in the number of species they 
include, for this is comparatively limited ; but, on the one hand, in the extraordi- 
nary development as to size which most of these species present ; and on the other, 
