INVERTEBRATA, CRYPTOGAMIA, MICROSCOPY, ETC 933 



The organ which has been regarded as the testicle lies below the 

 enteric tract ; it commences as an unpaired tube, but soon bifurcates. 



Molluscoida. 



Australian Polyzoa.* — The Rev. J. E. Tenison-Woods gives a 

 description and figure of an Amathia from Australia, which he considers 

 new, and calls A. torfuosa, and takes the opportunity of reviewing the 

 family. This species is, however, common in the Mediterranean, and 

 is no doubt the Serialaria semiconvoluta of authors on the Mediter- 

 ranean fauna, which has, however, as yet been but imperfectly and not 

 always correctly described. The fact of the cells being biserial has 

 led one Australian author to form a new genus for the species, but 

 the growth is the same with the Mediterranean and several other 

 species, which, however, varies much in the length of the inter- 

 nodes, so that one Euroi^ean writer has, in manuscript, called a variety 

 similar to the Australian one, Serialaria distans. 



Mr. Woods has not given the size of his forms, which is impor- 

 tant, as we believe the variety in the Australian seas has a much larger 

 growth than the Mediterranean one. Although this paper is founded 

 on a mistake, Mr Woods has put together a great deal of information 

 on the family which will be of use to workers in Australia, where the 

 literature is not so easily obtainable. 



Mr. Woods very wisely gives a figure of what he considered a new 

 species, and it would be a great benefit if other authors would follow 

 him in this, for several Australian and New Zealand workers have 

 lately been giving descriptions without plates, and thus names have 

 been created, to a large extent, of forms wliich the descriptions (in not 

 a few cases imperfect) will not enable others to recognize. 



Fossil Cateidcellae from the (Australian) Mioeene.t — Mr. J. B. 

 Wilson reports tae discovery of Catenicelhe in the Miocene Tertiary 

 beds near Geelong, on whicli Mr. Busk has favoured us with the fol- 

 lowing note : — 



" The occurrence of Catenicellidsc in the fossil state, and so far back 

 as the Miocene epoch, if that be really the age of the beds, is an impor- 

 tant and interesting fact. In 18G5 the Rev. J. E. Tenison-Woods, in a 

 paper on the fossil Polyzoa of the same district, laid i)articular stress 

 on the circumstance that the marine fauna of that period ditlbred 

 essentially from the existing fauna in tlie total absence of Catenicel- 

 lida;, which form, as it may be said, one of the most characteristic 

 features of tlie existing Australian marine fauna (so far as the Polyzoa 

 are concerned). It now a^ipears that in rtality the Miocene fauna 

 was as rich in those forms as it is now. Mr. Wilson enumerates 

 about twenty extinct species, all, ho says, ditlennt from the existing 

 ones, which, so far as I am aware, do not amount to more than thirty. 



When we consider that beyond the Australian region, including, 

 of course, New Zeahind, scarcely more than a single species of 

 Calenicclla is anywliero met with at the present time, and that none 



* Tonison- Woods, Rev. .1. K., " On tho Ginus Atnithia of Lam., witli a, 

 Description of new Species," 'Trans, and Proo. R. Sec. Vict.,' ivi. (1880). 

 t • Joiirii. Micr. 8oc. Vict.,' i. (1880) pp. (30-3. 



