ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 459 



j3. Myriopoda. 



Seychelles Myriopods.* — Dr. C. G. Attems has been entrusted with 

 Dr. Brauer's large collection of Myriopods from the Seychelles. Hitherto 

 the Myriopods of the islands have been known chiefly from Broelemaun's 

 description of Alluaud's collection, which contained 13-14 species. Of 

 the 23 species in Brauer's collection 13 are new to science, and only 7-8 

 are also present in Broelemann's collection, which suggests that the 

 Myriopod fauna of the islands is still inadequately known. Four of the 

 new species are types of new genera. 



Diplopoda of Greece. f — Dr. Carl Verhoeff, in the course of his 

 monograph on the Palsearctic Myriopoda, has reached the Diplopoda 

 of Greece, and finds that the fauna of this area shows many peculiarities. 

 For example, it has not a single species in common with Germany or 

 France ; even certain regions of Austria have no species in common with 

 Greece. Among the notable peculiarities in regard to the genera and 

 families the following are worth notice : — The Lysiopetalidse are very 

 abundant, the Chordeumida3 iew, and the GlomeridaB virtually absent ; 

 Colobognatha occur which are South Mediterranean in type; among the 

 Julidae the genera Brachyjulus and Pa> hyjulus occur, Blanjulus, Isobates, 

 and Cylindrojulus are absent, and Julus is only feebly represented ; the 

 endemic genera are Cyphobracliyjulus and Himatiopetalum ; true sub- 

 tropical forms are absent, but an affinity with the fauna of Italy is 

 suggested by Dolistenus and the sub-genus Acanthopetalum, with that 

 of Austria-Hungary by Callipcdella, with that of Asia Minor by 

 Symphyojulus. 



y- Prototracheata. 



Genera of Prototracheata. f — Prof. E. L. Bouvier discusses the 

 British Museum collection, and distinguishes the five genera composing 

 the class, namely Peripatus (Guild.) Pocock, Peripatoides Pocock, Opis- 

 thopatus Purcell, Peripatopsis Pocock, and Paraperipatus Willey. He 

 suggests that the most important structural modifications are the result 

 of processes of atrophy several times repeated, which have reduced and 

 fixed the number of appendages. 



Phylogeny of Onychophora.§ — Prof. E. L. Bouvier accepts the view 

 that the Onychophora have arisen from aquatic Annelids. He then dis- 

 cusses the different forms, and concludes that the Peripatus type is the 

 most primitive. Their small eggs without yolk suggest an ancestry 

 among Polycksete Annelids. 



In Peripatus the placental' mode of nutrition predominates ; in Peri- 

 patoides the egg accumulate s a considerable quantity of nutritive material 

 within itself; in Paraperipatus and Peripatopsis the utilisation of the 

 uterine fluid becomes gradually predominant. 



From a common ancestral trunk arise tbe.se three divergent branches, 

 marked also by their male sexual organs. In this respect Paraperipatus 

 and Peripatopsis are nearest the ancestral types, and Peripatoides is much 

 more remote. 



* Zool. Jahrb. (Abth. Syst.), xiii. (1900) pp. 133-71 (3 pis.), 

 t Tom. cit., pp. 172-204 (1 pi.). 



X Quart. Journ. Micr. Sci., xliii. (1900) pp. 367-73 (4 figs.). 

 § Couiptes lieiuius, exxx. (1900) pp. 735-8. 



