THE 
NATURAL HISTORY REVIEW: 
A 
QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF BIOLOGICAL SCIENCE. 
fvitiinus. 
XXVIII. —Introduction to the Study oe the Eoraminieera. 
By William B. Carpenter, M.D., E.R.S., etc. Assisted by Wil¬ 
liam K. Parker, Esq., and T. Rupert Jones, Esq., E.G-.S. Lon¬ 
don: published for the Ray Society by Robert Hardwicke. 1862. 
The Microscope and its Revelations. By William B. Car¬ 
penter, M.D., E.R.S., etc. Third Edition. London: John 
Churchill. 1826. 
The last publication of works on the part of the Ray Society was 
one, we have reason to understand, which gave considerable satisfac¬ 
tion to the subscribers generally, and which we ourselves could not 
but regard with favour; first, insomuch as two members of our 
editorial body contributed, each in his own department, towards its 
successful issue, and, secondly, because the two volumes, which it 
comprised, differed so widely in subject-matter from one another. 
The merits of Prof. Hofmeister’s treatise are well known and 
justly appreciated, and it is not for us to speak of the manner in 
which it has been translated by Mr. Currey. The members of the 
Ray Society may congratulate themselves on possessing a work, 
which has not, in this its new edition, as yet appeared in the original. 
Purely English in its origin, though less extensive in its range, 
treating, as it does, of only a single order of animals, the work of Dr. 
Carpenter and his Assistants comes more immediately before our 
notice. And it is perhaps worthy of record that while the soft parts 
of the Eoraminifera have been best studied by continental naturalists, 
particularly Dujardin and Schultze, the strangely diversified shells to 
which these creatures give rise have received their most thorough 
and complete elucidation at the hands of British investigators. 
The present “ Introduction” forms a volume in imperial quarto, 
with more than three hundred pages, twenty-two lithographic 
plates, and several woodcuts. Why so modest a title has been given 
to a mass of printed matter so weighty and powerful may seem 
N. Ii. R.—1863. Z 
