86 NATURAL SCIENCE [August 



Astacilla by having the flagellum of the second antennae more than 

 four-jointed. Nature lures us on by showing species after species in 

 which the joints are more than four, and, when we are purely 

 satisfied with our generic character, brings to view Arcturus 

 multispi7iis, in which the flagellum in question is single-jointed. 

 When Astacilla has established a character for preferring shallow 

 water, Mr Jules Bonnier describes the remarkable Astacilla giardi 

 from a depth of more than 500 fathoms, and now from 1825 fathoms 

 comes Mr Benedict's A. caeca. Mr Beddard has pointed out 

 that the genera Arcturus and Astacilla " form almost the only 

 exception to the general statement that the deep sea Isopoda are 

 blind," and now Mr Benedict's last-mentioned species comes as an 

 exception to this exception, being a blind Isopod from the deep 

 sea. 



In a second paper, simultaneously published in the same 

 Proceedings (vol. xii., pp. 53-55), Mr Benedict describes two new 

 Californian species, both of which he assigns to the genus Idotea, 

 relying for the limits of that genus on the monograph of the 

 Idoteidae by E. J. Miers, published in 1883. It is rather surprising 

 that he takes no notice of the far more recent discussion of this 

 family by Mr Adrien Dollfus in the Feuille des Jeunes Natur- 

 alistes, November 1894, and February 1895. Few students who 

 have read the papers by Mr Dollfus will be ready to retain Mr 

 Benedict's two new species in one and the same genus. 



Miss Harriet Richardson, also in the same publication (xii., 

 pp. 39-40) describes and figures a new species of ^Ega, closely 

 related to AEga tridens, Leach. The discriminating characters do 

 not seem to be all of them quite convincing. One of these 

 depends on the number of joints in the flagella of the antennae, 

 the new yEga ecarimata having on the second pair ten joints, 

 while Leach's species has nineteen. It is true that the number 

 nineteen is assigned to it by Schiodte and Meinert, but Bate and 

 Westwood say that the number is about twelve, and it may be taken 

 for granted that there is no fixity in this respect to depend on 

 among specimens of different ages and different sizes. The relative 

 length and breadth of the body is likely to prove an equally unstable 

 character. The new species is said to be more than thrice as long 

 as broad, and the figure given agrees with this measurement, but so 

 does the figure of JEga tridens given by Schiodte and Meinert, 

 though that drawn by Bate and Westwood is of a more portly 

 habit. 



Under present conditions of human existence the scattering of 

 scientific information remains unavoidable, so that one can merely 

 note, without astonishment or disapproval, that one new species of 

 jEga obtained by the U.S. Fish Commission steamer ' Albatross ' 





