254 Transactions - 



There is a general resemblance to the funnel of the " brown 

 tubes " of Echiurus unicinctus. 



Loc. — Bush-covered plateau, 600 ft. above sea-level. 



Mr. Shakespear writes, " The curious thing about these large 

 worms is that we never see any castings about. With this one 

 a slight crack in the soil was noticed, as when a mushroom is 

 coming through, but there was no hole coming to the surface. 

 My daughters dug down about 2 ft. before they came upon the 

 worm, the passage winding horizontally, but slowly going 

 downwards. The soil is decomposed volcanic breccia, and 

 fairly stiff." 



Remarks. — I have included this worm in the genus 

 Diporochceta, for it only differs from it in being micronephric. 

 The genus was founded in 1890 by Mr. Beddard* for megane- 

 phric worms with many chaetae and cylindrical prostates, and 

 D. intermedia, from New Zealand, is the type ; but since that 

 time a number of other species have been described from 

 Australia and Tasmania. Amongst these Spencer has included 

 two worms having micronephridia — viz., D. notabilis and 

 D. maplestoni, from Victoria, both of which, however, differ 

 from the present species. 



These certainly agree more closely with the typical Di- 

 porochcBta than they do with either of the other Megascolecine 

 genera in which many chsetae form a continuous series round 

 each segment — viz., Pheretima, Megascolex, Plionogaster, and 

 Perionyx. The first three are micronephric, but it is only to 

 Megascolex that our species show any close resemblance, from 

 which, however, it differs in the cylindrical character of the 

 prostate. 



I have already pointed out that within the Acanthrodriline 

 genus Plagiochceta, which is normally meganephric, species 

 (e.g., PL rossi) with small and multiple nephridia occur ; and 

 the presence of large nephrostomes in D. gigantea (and in the 

 following species, D. shakespeari) indicates that the micronephric 

 condition has only recently been evolved. 



4. Diporochaeta shakespeari, n. sp. 



This new species is founded upon the results of a study of 

 about a dozen individuals. 



Colour. — The living worm is pale-red — i.e., it is without 

 pigment in the body-wall, so that the blood shows through. 

 The clitellum is yellowish. When preserved either in alcohol 

 or in formol the colour is opaque-white and the clitellum yellow. 



Dimensions. — The formol specimens measure from 115 mm. 

 by 4 mm. to 120 mm. by 5 mm., the latter having 195 segments. 



* Proc. Zool. Soc, 1890, p. 56. 



