VOL. III.] Recent Literature. 365 



Gordiodrilus is the name of a new genus of Oligochaeta provision- 

 ally placed in the family of Ocnerodrilidae by its describer, F. E. 

 Beddard (Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., ser. 6, Vol. x, No. 55). The 

 genus comes near the American genus Ocnerodrilus, which later 

 reaches its greatest development, as far as is known, on the Pacific 

 Coast. Gordiodrilus differs from Ocnerodrilus in having only one 

 oesophageal diverticulum in somite ix, Ocnerodrilus having this organ 

 paired. The male or spermduct, which in Ocnerodrilus opens in so- 

 mite xvii, always in the same pore as a prostate, opens in Gordiodrilus 

 in somite xviii, always in a different pore from the prostate, but in the 

 same somite as that organ. Beddard describes five species of Gordi- 

 odrilus from Africa and the West Indies. The memoir is very in- 

 teresting to Pacific Coast investigators, as the new genus forms a 

 connecting link between Ocnerodrilus and the higher terrestrial 

 Oligochaeta. Here may be incidentally mentioned that a new 

 genus not yet described, recently found in Baja California, is in 

 many respects intermediate between Ocnerodrilus and Gordio- 

 drilus, having one pair of diverticula in somite ix, originating in the 

 anterior part of the somite. The spermduct opens in somites xviii 

 and xvii, the posterior one independently of the prostates, one pair of 

 which open in somite xvii and one in xix. G. E. 



"Expedition a la gruta de Cacahuamilpa." Under this heading 

 we find a memoir of twenty pages, describing the results of a col- 

 lecting expedition to a cave called "Cacahuamilpa," somewhere in 

 Mexico; the exact locality is not given ("El Estudio," Tom IV, No. 

 8, Mexico, Sept., 1892). 



The memoir is accompanied by two plates containing forty-five 

 drawings of animals, described as new in a most singular manner. 

 There are eleven species pretended to be new, ranging in almost as 

 many different families, from Coleoptera to mollusks and mammals, 

 and all are given as specific name "cacahuamilpensis." Many 

 species are given a new name, probably in order that all may be 

 uniformly "cacahuamilpensis," though the old and first name is 

 sometimes kindly appended. The descriptions are such that not a 

 single species can be identified, not even as to genus, and the figures 

 are in the style of those seen in our daily newspapers. 



It would have been much better to distribute the collections 

 to specialists than to disgrace the zoological literature in this way. 



