Imperfect Character Research Articles

Investigating older women as lead protagonists: an Australian case study of Stateless (2020)

ABSTRACT Screen Australia’s Gender Matters Program (2015–2023) addresses the underrepresentation of women in the screen industry. Older women continue to be less visible and stereotyped on screen which will be examined in this paper on the Australian television mini-series Stateless (Freeman and Moorhouse 2020). Stateless is an award-winning series commissioned and screened by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and acquired by Netflix. This case study will apply a framework comprised of five guiding principles to writing older women to analyse the portrayal of the two major female characters. The five principles are based on unpublished Honours research data addressing the representation of older women: as the lead protagonist; as authentic, capable, complex characters; in powerful leadership positions; depicted at work in an occupation in a non-traditional role; and as flawed imperfect characters. Lauzen’s 2021 Boxed In report highlights the underrepresentation of women forty and over on broadcast and streaming services. The case study reveals that the female protagonists in Stateless are two contrasting complex, authentic characters who actively pursue their respective goals.

Where Darkness Blooms by Andrea Hannah

Reviewed by: Where Darkness Blooms by Andrea Hannah Fiona Hartley-Kroeger Hannah, Andrea Where Darkness Blooms. Wednesday/St. Martin’s, 2023 [320p] Trade ed. ISBN 9781250842626 $18.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9781250842633 $10.99 Reviewed from digital galleys Ad Gr. 10-12 The women of Bishop, Kansas, have been disappearing ever since the town was founded, murdered by men of the founder’s family to satiate the cursed land. Why is the land cursed? Readers are better off not asking and simply following the alternating [End Page 189] narrators—Delilah, Bo, and twins Whitney and Jude—as the four girls navigate their interpersonal relationships, attempt to unravel the disappearance of their mothers, and confront the myriad ways they’re trapped in a dead-end town. Though a prologue knocks the suspense out of the bigger picture, smaller mysteries abound: Why did local heartthrob Bennett Harding suddenly dump Jude for Delilah, and why does his touch cause Delilah pain? What really happened to Whitney’s girlfriend Eleanor, found dead in her own front yard? What are whispers on the wind trying to tell the girls, and what secrets hide in the fields of sunflowers that surround the town? The gender politics are blunt, and well-intentioned attempts at gender inclusivity fall a little flat—some readers may find trans women being sacrificed alongside their cis sisters a pretty gruesome form of gender affirmation, even though there’s also a surviving older trans woman. However, the messy, imperfect characters, uniquely Midwestern creepiness, and scenes of cathartic violence as things escalate from bad to bloody will certainly find an audience. Throw this one on the “revenge girls” reading pile. Copyright © 2022 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Romancing Queer Theology and Reproductive Diversity

155 BOOKS IN REVIEW studies and pedagogy today. Lavender, however, brings together a novel set of texts that do not (especially in the case of Hurston and Wright) appear to be science-fictional in any obvious sense and clearly argues an against-thegrain reading of African American literary history (and literature itself) that reimagines the relationships among mimesis, speculation, futurity, and the political life of texts that extend beyond themselves (something Seo-Young Chu was asking us to take seriously more than ten years ago). Section two’s focus on literature does to some extent seem imbalanced compared to the first part’s stunning display of interconnections among literary and non-literary texts. Given just how diverse and well-documented the Black resistance movements of the twentieth century are, Lavender has wisely chosen not to bite off more than any one book can chew—and he acknowledges as much in the introduction. Instead he sets a precedent by studying afrofuturism as a way of reading Black history and literature. He demonstrates his reading practice first as a cultural historian making meaning for Black life in periods when African American literary production was limited as a field of written texts by slavery and Jim Crow. Black creators instead produced other kinds of texts that literary scholars have turned to in recent decades, whether those were written in music or blood or abolitionist dreaming. And second, he demonstrates that the very creation of “African American literature” as a concept in the twentieth century, after Kenneth W. Warren’s 2011 postmortem What Was African American Literature?, was always in the process of creating Black meaning, negotiating raced space and time, and those deeply embedded in afrofuturist practices. After all, as a speculation on what it means to be Black in an America of double consciousnesses and machine-/alien-like objectifications of the racialized other, how can African American literature not be deeply speculative? With this new book, Lavender shows us a path forward in our efforts to better understand the increasingly obvious but always already science-fictional world we inhabit.—Sean Guynes, Michigan State University. Romancing Queer Theology and Reproductive Diversity. Regina Yung Lee and Una McCormack, eds. Biology and Manners: Essays on the Worlds and Works of Lois McMaster Bujold. Liverpool UP, 2020. 308 pp. $105.47 hc. Known for her humor, plot twists, and well-developed, engagingly imperfect characters, award-winning sf and fantasy writer Lois McMaster Bujold has been a fan favorite for thirty-five years, earning seven Hugos, three Nebulas, and the 2020 SFWA Grand Master’s Award. Most of her work is set in three different universes: the VORKOSIGAN sf saga (1986-2018), the CHALION fantasy series (2001-2005), and the SHARING KNIFE romance/fantasy series (2006-2019). Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, she has also gained considerable critical attention for the quality and complexity of her work. Critical essay collections include Janet Brennan Croft’s anthology, Lois McMaster Bujold: Essays on a Modern Master of Science Fiction and Fantasy (2013) and Edward James’s Lois McMaster Bujold (2015). Now building on earlier scholarship and in response to Biology and Manners: The Worlds of 156 SCIENCE FICTION STUDIES, VOLUME 48 (2021) Lois McMaster Bujold, a conference held 20 August 2014 at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK, a volume of conference proceedings has come together with fourteen cogent essays that approach Bujold from various critical directions, including feminism, queer theory, medievalism, linguistics, disability studies, and fan fiction. The title is apt, since much of Bujold’s fiction speculates on the intersections of biology and social mores or manners. The floral cover image, taken from Buissons ardents [ardent bushes], a tapestry by French Benedictine monk Dom Robert (Gu de Chaunac-Lanzac, 1907-1997), reflects a “vivid and fertile depiction of the natural world” through a “feminized medium” (cover page), evoking insider humor, since at first glance, the packaging resembles a biology textbook with three different stylized butterflies to represent each of her series. The book is divided into six sections, plus index and contributors’ biographies. In the “Introduction: The Emergence of Bujold Studies,” the editors explain how the anthology places particular emphasis on the fantasy series, which...

Applying a Multi-Model Ensemble Method for Long-Term Runoff Prediction under Climate Change Scenarios for the Yellow River Basin, China

Given the substantial impacts that are expected due to climate change, it is crucial that accurate rainfall–runoff results are provided for various decision-making purposes. However, these modeling results often generate uncertainty or bias due to the imperfect character of individual models. In this paper, a genetic algorithm together with a Bayesian model averaging method are employed to provide a multi-model ensemble (MME) and combined runoff prediction under climate change scenarios produced from eight rainfall–runoff models for the Yellow River Basin. The results show that the multi-model ensemble method, especially the genetic algorithm method, can produce more reliable predictions than the other considered rainfall–runoff models. These results show that it is possible to reduce the uncertainty and thus improve the accuracy for future projections using different models because an MME approach evens out the bias involved in the individual model. For the study area, the final combined predictions reveal that less runoff is expected under most climatic scenarios, which will threaten water security of the basin.

Re-Introducing Digenis Akritis: A Byzantine Poem of Strength, Weakness, and the Disturbing Absence of God

Digenis Akritis, a twelfth-century Byzantine poem, recounts the life of Basil, a fictional hero of mixed descent (Byzantine and Arab), on the eastern frontier of the Byzantine empire in the ninth or tenth century. Since the poem’s rediscovery in the late nineteenth century, virtually all scholars have regarded Basil’s heroic nature as a given, and his transgressions (mostly sexual) as no more than one might expect of a man of action in a violent world. In contrast, I shall argue that the poem was intended as a cautionary tale of human weakness. My study has two parts. The first focuses on Basil as a man of uncontrollable impulses, leading a largely solitary life-except for the wife whom he adores and betrays. In encounters with other women, he is moved not just to infidelity but to sexual and even fatal violence; then, seized by guilt, he seeks to atone by creating ever more elaborate (and isolated) garden paradises. Throughout these experiences, Basil never seeks spiritual guidance, or asks God for forgiveness. The second part deals with the story’s possible origins. As no other extant work of Byzantine literature is thematically comparable, I trace those origins to Western Europe. French chansons de geste of the late twelfth century, and their close German derivatives, pioneered the realistic depiction of imperfect characters. Digenis Akritis emerges not just as a study in impulse and isolation, but as a rare instance of Western cultural influence in Byzantium.

A production scheduling problem considering random failure and imperfect preventive maintenance

Many manufacturing companies are suffering from increasing machine wear with usage and age as degradation process. For a company to be successful, machines need to work continuously and make more profit in a certain period. However, machines can be unavailable due to the scheduled maintenance and unexpected failures. Hence, this study connects production scheduling with maintenance planning for a repairable system. Three types of maintenance are performed to restore the machines: (1) minimal repair is undertaken upon failure and the machine restored “as bad as old”; (2) replacement as a kind of perfect maintenance is implemented based on a cost–time rate function, which is defined to evaluate the economy of preventive maintenance action; and (3) preventive maintenance just makes the machine less deteriorated but not “as good as new.” Age reduction factor and failure rate increase factor are introduced to illustrate the imperfect character. The objective of this study is to maximize the total profit that is composed of production value, production cost, maintenance cost (including the preventive maintenance cost, replacement cost, and minimal repair cost for random failure), and lateness cost (which is contributed by the job sequence and maintenance activities). Finally, the proposed model is validated by a numerical example.

ON ERROR: UNDISCIPLINED THOUGHTS ON ONE OF THE CAUSES OF INTELLECTUAL PATH DEPENDENCY

Düşünceler tarihinde insan ediminin mükemmel olmayan karakterine (yani, hata yapma kabiliyetine) ne kadar yer ayrılmıştır? Konvansiyonel düşünce tarihi yazımı içinde hemen hemen hiç. Oysa entellektüel tarih bu tür hatalarla doludur ve bu hatalar entelektüel patikaya bağımlılığın en büyük sebebidir. Entellektüel patikalar, düşünsel hataların sonuçlarının ortadan kalkmaması sebebiyle düşünürleri kendisine bağımlı hale getirir. Hatalar ne kadar küçük olursa olsun pozitif geri bildirimler nedeniyle düşünsel patikalar, çoğu zaman, düşünsel patolojilere dönüşür. Bu koşullar altında, bazı hatalar düzeltilse bile, düşüncelerin genel evrimi mükemmellik seviyesine yakınsamaz.

Nanocrystalline transition aluminas: Nanostructure and features of x-ray powder diffraction patterns of low-temperatureAl2O3polymorphs

Low-temperature $\ensuremath{\gamma}$-, $\ensuremath{\eta}$-, and $\ensuremath{\chi}\text{\ensuremath{-}}{\mathrm{Al}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ polymorphs were studied by high resolution transmission electron microscopy and x-ray powder diffraction along with computer simulation of the diffraction patterns. Planar defects lying on the {111}, {110}, and {100} planes, which are the origin of the broadening of x-ray diffraction peaks in different forms of aluminium oxide, were revealed. In addition to providing strong experimental support for the imperfect character of the specimen structures, these results demonstrate the possibility of using nanosized crystalline domains with a spinel-type arrangement, which are regularly shaped and have a specified, developed face and bounding surfaces, for the description of the nanostructure of a whole variety of low-temperature ${\mathrm{Al}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ derivatives. It was found that different ways of domain packing in the oxide particles with a subsequent formation of planar defects contribute to specific kinds of line-shape broadening observed in the x-ray diffraction patterns of these materials. The mechanism of the vacancy generation upon propagation of the shear-type defect in the {110} plane of the spinel structure, which changes the ${\mathrm{Al}}_{3}{\mathrm{O}}_{4}$ stoichiometry to ${\mathrm{Al}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{3}$, is also discussed.

Undecidable Decisions: Rationality Limits and Decision-making Heuristics

In this article the theoretic evolution and the empirical-experimental efforts that have led to the affirmation of the bounded/procedural rationality paradigm are discussed. Moreover, the debate on supporters of the “optimization” approach and supporters of the “bounded/procedural rationality” approach is traced, highlighting the irreconcilability of these two approaches and, in retort, a solid defense against a merely “reductionist” attempt of the innovative context of the Simonian theory. Critically going over the debate on decision dynamics, it becomes clear how, due to the uncertain nature of rational processes, it is impossible to establish the decision-making best way. The imperfect character of individual choice is explained by how the decider identifies a solution that appears satisfying in that moment due to cognitive and temporal limits.

Polyurethane Networks Bearing Dendritic Wedges: Synthesis and Some Properties

Polyurethane networks bearing dendritic wedges of the second, third and fourth generation were prepared by polymerization of dendritic diols of the corresponding generation with a commercially available triisocyanate (Desmodur RFE). The formation of a three-dimensional network was greatly influenced by the shielding effect especially of dendritic wedges of generation four. This phenomenon led to an increase of the sol fraction with rising generation number. The swelling behavior of polyurethane networks was studied by means of molecular dynamics simulations and the results were compared, in a qualitative sense, with experimental data. As opposed to the theoretical data for perfect networks, the experimental swelling ratio increased as a function of generation number. The discrepancy between molecular simulations and experimental data was attributed to the imperfect character, i.e., the presence of defects, of synthesized networks comprising dendritic wedges of higher generations. Since the cross-linker Desmodur RFE contains phosphorus, 31P NMR was applied to reveal the effect of dendritic wedges on the mobility of junction points. Both the line widths and T1 relaxation data proved to be sensitive to the effect of the generation number on the mobility of network junctions.

Archives of Clinical Skiagraphy (1896)

The object of this publication is to put on record in permanent form some of the most striking applications of the New Photography to the needs of Medicine and Surgery. The progress of this new Art has been so rapid that, although Prof. Rontgen's discovery is only a thing of yesterday, it has already taken its place among the approved and accepted aids to diagnosis. At the first moment, the statement that it had been found possible to penetrate the fleshy coverings of the bones, and to photograph their substance and contour, seemed the realization of almost an impossible scientific dream. The first essays were of a rough and imperfect character; week after week, however, improvements have been made in the practical application of the Art, which I venture to call Skiagraphy; and, at the present time, we are in a position to obtain a visible image of every bone and joint in the body.

Delivery-contingent Contracts for Research

The effectiveness of contracts in the provision of research is undermined by the highly uncertain nature of the research enterprise, the imperfect character of knowledge about a given project, and the thin market for specialized research services.... Finally, the difficulty of specifying all contingencies and the uncertainty associated with complex research projects will reduce firms' reliance on external providers for such research.

Anti-Semitism and apostasy in Nineteenth-Century France: A response to Jonathan Helfand

In Passports and Piety: Apostasy in Nineteenth-Century (Jewish History, Fall 1988), Jonathan Helfand addresses one of central issues in study of Jewish communities of West in modem period. In discussing extent of conversion from Judaism to Christianity in France, he poses question of whether Jews were able to participate in mainstream of French society in decades following emancipation without relinquishing their ties to Jewish community. Recognizing imperfect character of Jewish emancipation in France, that is, failure of legislative action to eliminate social discrimination and religious prejudice, Helfand asks whether anti-Semitism remained so pervasive after Revolution that it eroded Jewish loyalties and encouraged conversion to Christianity. In other words, was situation in France similar to that in German states before emancipation, when legal impediments to advancement led many ambitious and talented Jews to flee their Jewishness? Helfand answers in affirmative. As title of his article suggests, he believes that much-quoted aphorism of Heinrich Heine that baptism was the entrance ticket to European culture describes conditions in France as much as in Germany. He also believes that modem Jewish historiography has ignored conversion in France and that some historians have created false impression of situation by maintaining that apostasy was infrequent and uncharacteristic. His intention then is to offer a revision of prevailing view and its underlying presumptions. In his view, Jews were victims of discrimination in professional and public life throughout nineteenth century, and, as result, during first half of nineteenth century there was significant conversionist movement in France. ''1 Helfand's article joins growing body of literature on phenomenon of conversion in modem period 2 and is to be welcomed for casting discussion

Proposal for the Publication of a New English Dictionary by The Philological Society

PROPOSAL FOR THE PUBLICATION OF ANEW ENGLISH DICTIONARY BY THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY In the year 1857 the Philological Society determined to form a collection of words hitherto unregistered in the Dictionaries of Johnson and Richardson, with a view of publishing a supplementary volume, which might be used with either of those works. A committee was appointed, circulars were issued, and the public as well as members of the Society were invited to take part in the work. The success of the experiment was so encouraging, that some members of the Society, unwilling that the energies thus brought into play should be expended in the production of a work necessarily of a subordinate and imperfect character, strongly urged the propriety of extending the scheme to the compilation of a new and more Scientific Dictionary than any at present existing. This proposal was, after much deliberation, entertained and accepted, and the Philological Society, at its meeting of January 7, 1858, resolved that, instead of the Supplement to the standard English Dictionaries, then in the course of preparation by the Society's Unregistered Words Committee, a New Dictionary of the English Language should be prepared under the authority of the Philological Society. The work has been placed by the Society in the hands of two Committees; the one Literary and Historical, consisting of the Very Rev. the Dean of Westminster, F. J. Furnivall, Esq., and H. Coleridge, Esq., Secretary; and the other Etymological, consisting of Hensleigh Wedgwood, Esq., and Professor Maiden; and the former of these Committees will edit the Dictionary and direct the general working of the scheme. Arrangements for the publication of the work in 5i. Parts have been made with Messrs. Trübner and Co., of Paternoster Row. The object of the present Prospectus is twofold: first, to lay before the public, as concisely as possible, the main outlines of 179 180Proposal for A New English Dictionary the plan upon which the New Dictionary will be constructed, and to ask from that public such further help in the reading and noting of books as will enable the plan to be carried out satisfactorily; and, secondly, to furnish our contributors with such a system of mies as will direct them to the principal points to be attended to in perusing and analysing the books they may undertake, and also ensure general uniformity in the results arrived at. It will of course be understood that we cannot, within the limits of a mere circular like the present, do more than state the conclusions at which we have arrived, without attempting to enter into any arguments in their behalf, or any refutations by anticipation of possible objections. The whole subject will be most naturally and conveniently discussed in the preface to the work itself, and we must reserve our defence, if any be thought necessary, until that appears. Those who may wish for further satisfaction as to our lexicographical creed, than what can be gathered from this Prospectus, are referred to the Dean of Westminster's Essay "On some Deficiencies in our English Dictionaries," which leaves no important portion of the subject unnoticed. I. We may begin then by stating that, according to our view, the first requirement of every lexicon is, that it should contain every word occurring in the literature of the language it professes to illustrate. We entirely repudiate the theory, which converts the lexicographer into an arbiter of style, and leaves it in his discretion to accept or reject words according to his private notions of their comparative elegance or inelegance. In the case of the dead language, such as Greek, no lexicon of any pretensions would omit the ?pa? ?e??µe?a of Lycophron, or the experimental coinages of Aristophanes and the other comedians; and as we are unable to perceive any difference between a dead and living language, so far as lexicographical treatment is concerned, it follows that we cannot refuse to admit words into the Dictionary which may not be sanctioned by the usage of more than one writer, or be conformable in their structure to our ideas of taste. However worthless they may be in themselves, they testify to a tendency of language, and on...

Prophecy and Inspiration by Paul Synave, O. P., Pierre Benoit, O. P.

BOOK REVIEWS Prophecy and Inspiration. By PAUL SYNAVE, O.P., and PIERRE BENOIT, 0. P. Trans. by Avery Dulles, S. J. and Thomas L. Sheridan, S. J. New York, Desclee Company, 1961. Pp. 186 with bibliography and index. $8.75. This is a translation of the original treatise " Reseignements techniques ., in the volume " La Prophetie," one of the fine series translating the Summa of St. Thomas into French. The author, Fr. Benoit, in his preface to the English edition states that he regards the work as " still valid ., though modifications, interpolations and clarifications have been introduced either as the result of scholarly suggestions judiciously adapted or from the author's own reconsiderations of difficulties involved. The author's introductory paragraph to his study is a thoughtfully concise presentation of both difficulties and aims: " St. Thomas' treatise on prophecy is often used to clarify the notion of biblical inspiration, and has afiorded many valuable insights. ·It should be noted, however, that the " gift of prophecy " and " scriptural inspiration " are two distinct charisms, and that neither of them can be explained by the other without some adaptation. This fundamental observation has not always been kept sufficiently in mind, and as a result the subject has been obscured by confusions. It seems advisable, therefore, to explain St. Thomas' doctrine for its own sake and as clearly as possible before we study its bearing on modern discussions" (p. 61). In the first of his "Notes on Thomistic Doctrine," then, Fr. Benoit offers a synthesis of St. Thomas' teaching on the charism of prophecy, and in his exposition of its distinctive characteristics and divisions he also provides the groundwork for the discussion of biblical inspiration to follow . Prophecy is a social charism n?rmally manifesting to the prophet truths hidden to his mind. Two distinct elements enter into the knowledge of the prophet, the intellectual light which illuminates the object and causes one to form a judgment about it and the species which furnish the subject-matter for the judgment, the principal element. The conjunction or disjunction of these two elements and the various species whether sensory , imaginative or intellectual provide bases for the division of prophecy. This division includes the possibility ". . . that the supernatural light might be given to the prophet simply to make him judge in a divine way about human matters which were already represented in his mind . . . This is a matter of great importance, for the present case is one which occurs very frequently in Holy Scripture ., (p. 66) . Differences in terminology may likewise cause confusion, for " Today 445 446 BOOK REVIEWS we speak of inspiration when the mind of the' prophet receives only a light without representations, and of revelation when it receives both the one and the other., Can the authority of St. Thomas be invoked in favor of this terminology?" The author concludes that though the actual terms may differ there is foundation for it in Thomistic thought. A final note of importance in this section deals with the notion and application of instrumentality to prophecy in its varying degrees. The transitory character of the charism completely dependent upon God's intiative displays one of the features of an instrument as does also the imperfect character of the knowledge possessed. Still he insists that " However transitory and imperfect the prophet's possession of the supernatural light, it is none the less truly given to him in an intrinsic way, and so as to perfect him in himself. This is a crucial point, heavily stressed in St. Thomas' whole treatment. The prophet actually receives this light in his intellect; it reinforces the natural light of his reason and becomes for him an active principle of knowledge" (p. 79). "In short, St. Thomas, who likes to use terms in their formal meaning, rarely calls the prophet an instrument of the Holy Spirit except when he can use this expression in its proper and rigorous sense, i.e. when there is question of secondary and hidden meanings to which his light does not extend " (p. 88) . On leaving Fr. Benoit's discussion of the charism of prophecy, one carries away the impression that he has deliberately avoided any unneeded exemplification of...

Science in New South Wales

Science in New South Wales

On the structure and development of the liver

The author gives a detailed description of the structure of the liver in animals belonging to various classes of the animal kingdom. He states that in the Bryozoon, a highly organized polype, it is clearly of the follicular type; and that in the Asterias, the function of the liver is probably shared between the closed appendage of the stomach and the terminal cæca of the large ramifying prolongations of the digestive sac contained in the several rays. Among the Annulosa, the earthworm presents an arrangement of the elements of the hepatic organ, corresponding in simplicity with the general configuration of the body, a single layer of large biliary cells being applied as a kind of coating over the greater part of the intestinal canal. In another member of the same class, the Leech, in which the digestive cavity is much less simple, and presents a number of sacculi on each side, these elements have a very different disposition; and the secreting cells, although some remain isolated, for the most part coalesce to form tubes, having a succession of dilatations and constrictions, and finally uniting and opening into the intestine. In Insects, the usual arrangement is that of long curved filamentary tubes, which wind about the intestine; these, in the meat fly, are sacculated throughout the greater part of their course, till they arrive quite close to the pylorus, where they open; near their origin they appear to consist of separate vesicles, which become gradually fused together, but occasionally they are seen quite separate. The basement membrane of the tubes is strongly marked, and encloses a large quantity of granular matter of a yellowish tinge, with secreting cells; another portion of the liver consists of separate cells lying in a granular blastema, which cells, in a later stage of development, are seen to be included in vesicles or short tubes of homogeneous membrane, often coalescing and exhibiting a more or less manifestly plexiform arrangement; this portion of the liver is regarded by Mr. Newport as really adipose tissue. The author has termed it the Parenchymatous portion of the liver, on account of its general appearance and mode of development, though he has not been able to determine whether the tubes always originate from it. Among the Arachnida, the follicular type of arrangement prevails; and the same is the case with the Crustacea, the follicles in these last being distinctly visible to the naked eye. In Mollusca also, we find the follicular arrangement universally to obtain; yet in certain cases the limiting membrane of the follicles cannot be shown to exist, and the author therefore thinks that its importance is probably not great, but that it serves chiefly to fulfil the mechanical function which its synonym " basement ” indicates. The quantity of retained secretion in the liver of molluscs seems clearly to imply that the bile in them is not an excrementitious fluid; it is used slowly on account of the imperfect character of the respiration. In passing from the Invertebrata to the Vertebrate division of the animal kingdom, and beginning with the class of Fishes, a great change is immediately manifest in the form and character of the biliary organ; it is now a gland of solid texture, to which the term parenchymal is justly applied. Two portions may be distinguished in it, namely, the secreting parenchyma, consisting of delicate cells, or very often of nuclei, granular and elaborated matters in great part, and the excreting ducts, which, though completely obscured by the surrounding bulky parenchyma, may yet be satisfactorily demonstrated, and traced often to their terminal extremities in the following manner. If a branch of the hepatic duct be taken up in the forceps, it may be dissected out without much difficulty from the surrounding substance, which is very soft and yields readily to gentle manipulation; when a trunk is in this way removed and placed under the microscope, a multitude of minute ramifications are seen adhering to it; among these not a few may be discovered, which do not appear to have suffered injury; some are occasionally seen terminating by distinctly closed extremities; more usually the duct becomes very minute and gradually loses all definite structure, appearing at last like a mere tract of granular matter; in either case there is no communication by continuity with the surrounding parenchyma. Large yellow corpuscles, peculiar cells, and a considerable quantity of free oily matter usually existing in the liver of various fishes, seem generally to indicate a great superiority in the amount of secretory over that of excretory action, and to betoken clearly the feeble intensity of the aërating function.

On British Fossil Lepadidæ

Abstract M r . D arwin noticed that great confusion exists in the nomenclature of the comparatively few species of Cirrhipeds, hitherto found in a fossil state; arising both from the easy separation of the several dissimilar valves soon after the death of the animal, and from the imperfect characters afforded by the valves themselves, which are, as it were, but parts of the crustacean carapace, neither accompanied with, nor distinctly impressed by, any of the soft parts of the animal. He then pointed out such particular valves as were sufficiently distinct, and had sufficiently constant characters to he considered as characteristic of genera,–as, for instance, the keel, or dorsal, valve in Sealpellum , and the scutal, or inferior lateral, valve in Pollicipes . The pedunculated cirrhipeds ( Lepadidœ ) were stated to have made their first appearance in the lower oolite, and to have reached their culminant point in the cretaceous epoch. The absence of sessile cirrhipeds in the earlier and secondary formations, and their occurrence for the first time in the eocene deposits, were then noticed, the author dwelling on the characters of the genus Verruca , and pointing out that, as the type of a group intermediate between, and of equal value with, the sessile and the pedunculate cirrhipeds, it offered no real exception to the rule that sessile cirrhipeds do not occur in the secondary formations; but that, on the contrary, it harmonizes with the law of relation between serial affinities of animals and their first appearance on this earth. Mr. Darwin concluded with a few observations on the comparative ranges of recent and fossil eirrhipeds, and on the close affinities between the extinct and the living forms.