Notices of Irish Entozoa. 661 



P.S. — The rare opportunity of examining the char (Salmo 

 alpinus) having offered since writing the above, I beg leave 

 to add as an appendix, some account of an entozoic tumor 

 which I observed in that fish. 



My friend Mr. Thompson having on the 20th of the pre- 

 sent month obtained, through the kindness of James Stewart 

 Esq., of Cairnsmore, near Newtonstewart, Wigtonshire, a con- 

 siderable number of recent specimens of the char, taken in 

 Loch Grannoch, I examined along with him the viscera of 

 fourteen, his object being to ascertain the nature of their food 

 &c, and mine the Entozoa they might contain. 



Seven were males, and seven females, and in every one the 

 stomach was studded with white tubercles, generally of the 

 size of hemp-seed. Similar tubercles were also attached to 

 the oesophagus, the mesentery, the liver, (not only on the sur- 

 face, but also in the substance of the latter), the roe, and the 

 milt, as also the intestines. The stomach and cceca however 

 formed their chief habitats, and there they were in several in- 

 stances so numerous, as almost entirely to hide the surface. 



I found that each of these tumors contained a living worm, 

 enclosed under two coverings ; the outer being an extremely 

 delicate layer of peritonceum, and under this a white, thick- 

 ish sac, but tender, and easily ruptured, so that the Entozoon 

 could be extricated with the greatest ease. The tumors were 

 round, oval, or slightly pyriform. The worm was in motion 

 the moment it came into view ; it was smooth, and had a 

 bluish transparency ; it w T as about half an inch in length and 

 a line broad, but some specimens exceeded, and others fell 

 short of these dimensions. Very soon after its liberation it 

 lost its smoothness, and became transversely rugose, polymor- 

 phous, and more opaque, changes evidently arising from its 

 muscular system being now thrown into a hitherto unaccus- 

 tomed action. 



Description.— Head oblong, polymorphous, not distinct 

 from the body, with a lateral, long, and linear bothrium on 

 each side. The bothrium next the glass on which the ani- 

 mal lay, was sometimes so expanded as to give the head a 

 winged appearance ; neck none ; body parenchymatous, with- 

 out any appearance of internal cavity; in the microscope it 

 exhibited a granular structure, with very numerous transpa- 

 rent, orbicular spaces, like minute rings ; a few faint appear- 

 ances of longitudinal strice in some specimens, and not un- 

 frequently transverse, transparent lines, like pseudo-articula- 

 tions, but these were caused merely by muscular contraction. 

 Tail various in form, but mostly emarginate. Compression 



3 u 2 



