68 THE SCOTTISH NATURALIST 



Tadpole -fish in Largo Bay, Firth of Forth.— On 3rd 

 January 191 2 we picked up a Tadpole-fish {Raniceps raninus — 



trifurcatus), lying on the sands in Largo Bay. This species does 

 not seem to be very common in the Firth of Forth. Writing in 

 1838, Parnell records it from "the neighbourhood of Alloa" {Fishes 

 of the Firth of Forth, p. 361), and Mr W. Evans notes one from 

 South Queensferry in 1884, and another from North Berwick in 1908 

 {Proc. Roy. Phys. Soc, vol. xvii., p. 58). We sent our specimen to 

 Mr Eagle Clarke, who confirmed our identification. — Leonora 

 Jeffrey Rintoul and Evelyn V. Baxter. 



What is the Cellularia bassani of Montagu? — Having 

 been asked this question on several occasions recently, I am induced 

 to publish the following jottings on the subject, made three or four 

 years ago. 



In 1808, Montagu described under the name Cellularia bassani 

 a small parasite which he found in the subcutaneous cellular 

 membrane of gannets {Pelecanus {Sula) bassanus) captured, one 

 gathers, in the English Channel. The description, with figures, 

 was published in the Memoirs of the Wemerian Nat. Hist. Society, 

 vol. i. (1811), p. 191. Apparently this organism has seldom been 

 seen since its discovery. Dr R. G. Cunningham, in his well-known 

 treatise on the Gannet {Ibis for 1886), states that though he had 

 looked for it with care, he had not succeeded in meeting with it. 

 Mr J. H. Gurney, however, informs me he has found it, but only in 

 one instance— on a gannet from Ailsa Craig — out of six or seven 

 birds examined. Since becoming interested in the subject, I have 

 but once had an opportunity of looking for the creature, and then 

 unsuccessfully. As a generic name, Cellularia, it should here be 

 mentioned, was given by Pallas in 1766 to a genus of marine 

 Polyzoa, thus barring its use in the case of the gannet parasite. 



An organism very similar to Montagu's, known as Hypoderas, 

 or Hypodectes columbce, from the domestic pigeon, has been studied 

 by C. Robertson (Quart. Journ. Micr. Soc, 1866, p. 201), Megnin 

 (journ. Anat. et Physiol, 1877 and 1879), and others. Robertson 

 alludes to the close resemblance of Montagu's Cellularia bassani 

 to this, and any one who compares the figures of the two must be 

 struck by their similarity. Megnin found Hypodectes columbce to be 

 a hypopial stage of an Analgesid or bird mite, Pterolichus (now 

 Falculifcr) rostratus, Buchholz. Now, the only Analgesid that 

 appears to have been recorded from the gannet is Freyana (subgen. 

 Michaclia) caput-medusoz, Trouessart (see new edition of Naumann's 

 JVaturgeschichte der Vogel Mittclcuropas, and Canestrini's Sarcoptidie 



