144 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



do not "feign death" ; the web is slight ; the oviposition has not been 

 observed. The genus is separated from related forms mainly by the 

 structure of the copulatory organs, and the evolution of this in the 

 various species, starting from the most primitive Cantabrian and Pyren- 

 nean forms, seems to have progressed from west to east. J. A. T. 



e. Crustacea. 



Structure of Barnacles. — Hjalmar Brooh (A^ Nor she Videnslcab. 

 Selskahs Skrifter., 1918, 1, 1-28, 5 pis., 5 figs.). An account is given of 

 some anatomical and histological features of Anelasma squalicola 

 (Loven) Darwin and Scalpellum stromii M. Sars. It is shown that 

 Anelasma, in the general structure of its alimentary canal, occupies a 

 somewhat intermediate position between the less specialized Scalpellum 

 and the more highly specialized Gonclioderma and Lepas. In their 

 general structure the digestive glands of Anelasma are more highly 

 developed than in Scalpellum, and approach the high organization of 

 Gonclioderma ; on the other hand, their finer structure suggests resting 

 or even degenerating tissues. The digestive intestine seems to have 

 ceased to be a food-absorbing organ. This is associated with the 

 development of secondary nutritive organs, the offshoots or filaments of 

 the peduncle. These filaments have a dissolving influence on the tissue 

 of the shark on which the barnacle is fixed, and they are abetted in 

 this by secretions from the cement glands, which are numerous and 

 large. They do not, as in other stalked cirripeds, combine into two 

 groups or pass their secretion to the base of the stalk by two main ducts. 

 In Anelasma the single gland-cells communicate by short ducts with the 

 lacunae of the connective tissue. J. A. T. 



New Isopod of Natal. — Walter E. Collinge (Annals Natal 

 Museum, 1919, 4, 229-33, 1 pi.). A peculiar and interesting form, 

 Akermania spinosa g. et sp. U;, probably one of the Cubaridse, is described. 

 It differs from any terrestrial Isopod hitherto described, in the shape of 

 the cephalon, the folded coxopodite beneath the pleural plates of the 

 first mesosomatic segment, the feeble walking legs on segments 2-7, the 

 short expanded uropods with characteristic sette, and the shape of the 

 telson. It shows a strong development of spines, setae, and scales. 



J.A.T. 



Development of Testes in Parasitic Copepod. — M. CAULLERYand 

 F. Mesnil {G.R. Soc. Biol. Paris, 1919, 82, 596-8). In Xenococloma 

 brumpti, parasitic on Folycirrus arenivorus CaulL, there is hermaphrodi- 

 tism and apparently autogamy. In Cymothoidse, Cryptoniscidae, and 

 similar groups there is a normal and single primordium which produces 

 spermatozoa and ova successively or simultaneously. In Xenocmloma no 

 germinal cells are to be seen in the embryo or in the nauplius. In the 

 early parasitic stages, however, the ovary is distinctly differentiated and 

 the primordium of oviducts. Connected with this primordium there is 

 an epithelial complex, not different from ordinary epithelium, which 

 subsequently gives origin to testes, seminal vesicle, and the so-called 

 atrial cavity. Spermatogonia quite similar to oogonia appear in situ, in 



