14 AKT. 7. 1. IJIMA. 



final host, are related questions on which my observations offer no 

 clue to a solution. 



The head-buds in the Plerocercoid were observed in various 

 sizes, but I have not been able to trace them back with certainty 

 to the earliest stage of their formation. Perhaps from an early 

 period they are capable of active movements, now everting and 

 then inverting, so that the little rudiment, when fixed, may take 

 the form of an elevation or depression, which on sections might 

 not be easily distinguishable from mere irregularities of the surface. 

 An accumulation of parenchyma cells, such as might possibly 

 occur at the spot where a bud is to arise, has not come under 

 observation. 



The enormous numbers in which the parasite occurred in 

 the patient is explained, in large measure, by proliferation taking 

 ])lace in the host. A young and small Plerocercoid, after separa- 

 tion from the mother-body which produced it, may be assumed 

 to find its way out of the capsular wall. That act has not been 

 actually observed but seems to really take place from the fact 

 before mentioned that a number of the smaller sized Plerocercoids 

 were found free in the connective tissue. It is not to be doubted 

 that these free worms are to a certain extent capable of wander- 

 ing through the tissues b}^ virtue of the power of movements 

 with which they are endowed. Probably however the wandering 

 ceases after the worm has grown to a certain size and then it 

 would begin to give stimulus to the surrounding connective tissue 

 to form the capsule around it. Tliis stands entirely in harmony 

 with the account of the patient that from time to time new 

 acne-like elevations made their appearance on the skin. 



