Observations on the genus Ocythoë of Rafinesque : with a description of a new species / by William Elford Leach.

  • Leach, William Elford, 1790-1836.
Date:
1817
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the genus Ocythoë of Rafinesque : with a description of a new species / by William Elford Leach. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    Read before the ROYAL SOCIETY, June 5, 1817. Pliny, Aldrovandus, Lister, Rumphius, d’Argenville, Bruguiere, Bose, Cuvier, and Shaw, have described a spe- cies of this genus, that is often found in the Argonauta argo (common paper-nautilus) and which they have regarded as its animal, since no other inhabitant has been observed in it. Sir Joseph Banks, and some other naturalists, have always entertained a contrary opinion, believing it to be no more than a parasitical inhabitant of the Argonaut’s shell, and Rafl- NESQUE, (whose situation on the shores of the Mediterra- nean, has afforded him ample opportunities of studying this animal, and of observing its habits) has regarded it as a pecu- liar genus, allied to the Polypus* of Aristotle, residing parasitically in the above mentioned shell. Dr. Blainville, ten months since, when speaking of the Argonauta, said, “ animal unknown,” and he has lately in- formed me, that he has written a long dissertation to prove, that the Ocythoe of Rafinesque, does not belong to the shell in which it is found. The observatiorls made by the late Mr. John Cranch, zoologist to the unfortunate Congo expedition, have cleared from my mind any doubts on the subject. In the gulf of * Sepia octopodiii Li n n e.