Orr's Circle of the Sciences: Organic nature, v. 2] A system of natural history: 1. Botany and the invertebrated animalsWilliam Somerville Orr W.S. Orr and Company, 1855 |
Common terms and phrases
abdomen albumen amongst animals antennæ anther apex appears appendages arranged attached bark belonging body bristles calcareous calyx carpels cavity cells cellular cephalothorax Characters.-The cilia close colour common composed considerable consists corolla Cotyledons creatures Crustacea distinct distinguished divided division eggs embryo exhibit extremity eyes female filaments flowers fluid furnished genera genus habits hairs head hilum horny inclosed Infusoria inhabit insects intestinal joints labium larva larvæ latter leaf leaves legs length mass maxillæ membrane minute Mollusca Monogynia mouth nature ocelli organs outer ovary ovipositor ovule pair palpi parasitic petals petiole pistil placed placenta plants pollen polypes polypidom portion possess present produced pupa reproduction resemblance seed segments shell side skin sometimes species spiral stalk stamens stem stomata structure substance surface suture tentacles termed thorax tissue trees Triandria tribe tube usually vegetable ventral vessels Vorticella whilst whorl wings wood woody fibre
Popular passages
Page 247 - Actinia gemmacea, that might have been originally two inches in diameter, and that had somehow contrived to swallow a valve of Pecten maximus, of the size of an ordinary saucer. The shell, fixed within the stomach, was so placed as to divide it completely into two halves; so that the body, stretched tensely over, had become thin, and flattened like a pancake.
Page 251 - hair,' the unfortunate who has recklessly ventured across the graceful monster's path, too soon writhes in prickly torture. Every struggle but binds the poisonous threads more firmly round his body, and then there is no escape ; for when the winder of the fatal net finds his course impeded by the terrified human wrestling in its coils, he, seeking no combat with the mightier biped, casts loose his envenomed arms and swims away. The amputated weapons, severed from their parent body, vent vengeance...
Page 253 - Generations," or the remarkable, and till now inexplicable natural phenomenon of an animal producing an offspring, which at no time resembles its parent, but which, on the other hand, itself brings forth a progeny, which returns in its form and nature to the parent animal, so that the maternal animal does not meet with its resemblance in its own brood, but in its descendants of the second, third, or fourth degree or generation; and this always takes place in the different animals which exhibit the...
Page 245 - ... and in a Porites, of the same dimensions, in which the animals are under a line in breadth, the number exceeds five and a half millions; there are here, consequently, five and a half millions of mouths and stomachs to a single zoophyte, contributing together to the growth of the mass...
Page 183 - A knowledge of the properties of one plant enables the practitioner to judge scientifically of the qualities of other plants naturally allied to it ; and therefore the physician acquainted with the natural system of botany may direct his inquiries, when on foreign stations, not empirically, but upon fixed principles, into the qualities of the medicinal plants which have been provided in every region for the alleviation of the maladies peculiar to it. He is thus enabled to read the hidden characters...
Page 183 - Linmeus, in which there is no combination of ideas, but which are mere collections of isolated facts, having no distinct relation to each other.
Page 265 - Pentacrinuts briareus, must have been composed of at least 150,000 joints; and "as each joint," according to Dr. Carpenter, " was furnished with at least two bundles of muscular fibre, — one for its contraction, the other for its extension, — we have 3,000 such in the body of a single Pentacrinus — an amount of muscular apparatus far exceeding any that has been elsewhere observed in the animal creation.
Page 212 - Bombay, says in one case he saw " one of these creatures approach a gelatinous body, something like a sluggish or dead one of its own kind, and equal to itself in size, and having lengthened itself out, so as to encircle it, send processes over and under it from both sides, which, uniting with each other, at last ended in a complete approximation of the two opposite folds of the cell wall throughout their whole extent, and in the complete enclosure of the object.
Page 212 - ... enclosure of the object within the duplicature. Even while the protean was thus spreading out its substance into a mere film to surround so large an object, a tubular prolongation was sent out by it in another direction to seize and enclose in the same way a large germ which was lying near it. After having secured both objects, the protean pursued its course rather more slowly than before, but still shooting out its dentiform processes with much activity. It took about threequarters of an hour...
Page 247 - ... thin and flattened like a pancake. All communication between the inferior portion of the stomach and the mouth was of course prevented; yet, instead of emaciating • and dying of an atrophy, the animal- had availed itself of what undoubtedly had been a very untoward accident, to increase its enjoyments and its chances of double fare A new mouth furnished with two rows of numerous tentacula, was opened up on what had been the base, and led to the understomach: the individual had indeed become...