British Enchytr8eid>i. By Rev. H. Friend. 



25<> 



It will be seen that there are at once certain positive as well 

 as remarkable negative characters to guide one in the analysis. 

 The first is found in the position of the girdle. This organ is 

 normally seen in Enchytraeids occupying segment 12, and the only 

 exceptions to the rule are found in Biochholzia appendicidaUi and 

 two species of Marionina. One naturally concluded, on seeing 

 the girdle abnormally placed, that it must be one of these species 

 of Bnchhohia or Marionina, but a very 

 little investigation sufficed to show 

 how totally different the one was from 

 the others. This will be made more 

 clear as we proceed. The sperm- 

 funnels and ducts correspond with 

 the girdle. The position of other 

 organs will be set forth in the diagnosis. 

 The shape and number of the setae, the 

 shape of the brain, the shape and 

 position of the nephridia, the number 

 of septal glands, the large chloragogen 

 cells, the coelomic corpuscles, and the 

 special glands in front of the sperma- 

 thecae, are all additional points of 

 interest. 



Negatively one may emphasize the 

 absence of salivary glands, of a visible 

 vascular system, and of nephridia in 

 the preclitellian segments. 



There are a few striking points 

 yet to be noted before we proceed to 

 the description. In the ^rst place 

 there is a wider diff'erence in length 

 and number of segments between the 

 immature and the adult forms than 

 is usually observed. As a rule a young 

 Enchytraeid, though shorter than the 

 adult form, will have nearly or i|uite 

 the same number of segments. In the 

 case under observation the variation is very noteworthy 

 young worm there are, as usual, no traces of spermathecae, girdle, 

 sperm-duct and funnel, or other sexual organs, but those species 

 (as Henlea) w^iich possess oesophageal glands, or a sudden emergence 

 of intestine into oesophagus, show these alike in youth and maturity. 

 But here what appear at first sight to be oesophageal glands emerge 

 only in the adult in a vacant space between the third and fourth 

 pair of septal glands, while the fifth pair of septal glands, as they 

 appear to be in the young, disappear, or are scarcely discoverable, 

 in the adult, being in all probability transformed into organs of 



Fig. 23. — Two forms of nephridia, 

 C. chlorophilus Friend. 



In the 



