9 

 OVA OF PEXTHALEUS CAPIDARIUS. 63 



We had only time to reach Paignton by daylight, and discover Maywort, 

 {Artemisia vulgaris,) scattered about everywhere, and on some sandy soil near 

 the beach, Erodium maritimum, or Sea Crane's-bill, and were compelled to 

 leave it for a future ramble. 



Totnes, August 11th., 1851. 



A MICROSCOPIC EXAMINATION 

 OF THE OVA OF PENTHALEUS CAPIDARIUS.* 



BY SPENCER COBBOLD, ESQ., M. D. 

 Senior President of the Royal Medical Society of Edinburgh. 



Tni Ova, to which I wish to direct the attention of the Society this 

 afternoon, are very much allied in character to those of the common Harvest 

 Bug, {Leptus autumnalis,) and the common Itch Insect, {Acarus scabiei,) and 

 are considered by Mr. Edwin Giles, of Ipswich, to be those of Fenthaleua 

 capidarius, or Acarus capidanus, formerly called Acarus sellucis. 



The eggs now exhibited to the Society, are scattered over the surface of 

 Granite; and for the specimen before us, I am indebted to Stephen Jackson, 

 Esq., of Ipswich, who picked it up on the sea shore at Vallo, in Norway, 

 during the past summer; and by whom I am also informed, on the authority of 

 Mr. King, of the same town, that in the year 1842, it was very common 

 to find them attached to flints, old tiles, brickbats, and the like in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Ipswich, but since then it would seem that they have disappeared 

 from that district. 



When seen with the naked eye they look as minute white specks, and viewed 



singly, are scarcely discernible. Fig. 1. represents a section of the specimen 

 of the Granite, with the Ova scattered on its surface. When, however, we 

 examine them with a common pocket lens, we can at once detect their form 



• Kead before the Physiological Society of Edinburgh, Norember 22nd., 1851. 



