RESEARCHKS IN HELMINTHOLOGY AND PARA.SITOLOGY. 1 87 



convex at the end and emarginate or with a pore. Breadth at fore 

 part 3 mm., at back part 2 mm. The species may be named Both- 

 riocephahis {Dibof/iriiini) ccst7ts. 



[December, 1885. No. 534. See Bibliography.] 



Jlorms ill Ice. — Prof. Leidy referred to a former communication on 

 the occurrence of organisms in ice (see Proc, 1884, 260), and stated 

 that Dr. C. S. Thornton, of Moorestown, N. J., a couple of weeks 

 since, had submitted to him for examination a bottle of water from 

 melted ice, such as was habitually used in his family, and in which 

 he said he had observed living worms. A number of these proved to 

 be present in the specimen, but were all dead. Having expressed a 

 desire to confirm the statement that the worms were observed alive in 

 fresh ice-water, Dr. Thornton last week had obligingly sent him a 

 basket of the ice. This was part of the provision made nearly a 3'ear 

 ago from the vicinity of Moorestown. The ice was full of air bub- 

 bles and water drops. On being melted a number of the worms were 

 liberated and proved to be in a living and quite active condition. It 

 is probable that while imprisoned in the ice they may not have been 

 frozen, but perhaps remained alive in a torpid condition in water 

 drops. It is a remarkable fact that these animals should remain so 

 long alive in ice, and yet die so readily in the melted water subse- 

 quently. The worms are of the same species noticed in the ice- 

 water of the first communication, and which was derived from sim- 

 ilar ice procured from a mill-pond in Delaware Co. , Pa. These facts 

 would indicate that it is desirable to avoid the spongy ice from stag- 

 nant waters as being liable to retain organisms which would be 

 detrimental to us. In the clear ice, such as is served in Philadel- 

 phia, no living organisms are detected. The little worms of the ice 

 appear to be an undescribed species, and may therefore be charac- 

 terized as follows : 



Liimbrkiis glacialis. — Worm from four to six lines long, translu- 

 cent, white, cylindrical, anteriorly acute, tapering most behind and 

 obtuse, of from 35 to 50 segments ; oral segment with a blunt coni- 

 cal upper lip, unarmed and eyeless ; succeeding segments with four 

 rows of podal-spines, in fascicles of three ; spines pointed at the free 

 end and hooked at the attached end, nearly straight or slightly sig- 

 moid ; generative organs occupying the interval of the third and 

 seventh spine bearing segments. Thickness of worm 0.15 to 0.25 

 mm.; podal spines 0.3 to 0.375 mm. long. 



The length given in the former notice should be in lines instead 

 of millimeters. 



