4 JOURNAL OF THE [January^ 



mony, I requested Dr. Pierson, my medical adviser, to count 

 them also, and he confirmed my observations. 



To sum up : This experience is certainly one of the strangest 

 I ever passed through. Here is one form — Cordylophora coronafa^ 

 and a new one — existing in countless millions, and for months 

 together, in 1891, disappearing altogether in 1892; whilst the 

 typical form Cordylophora laciistris, represented in 189 1 by solitary 

 specimens, appeared in 1892 in the same countless millions, but 

 only for a few weeks. Is it possible that in these facts we have 

 an illustration of " alternation of generations " ? 



Melicerta ringens. — In a contribution to the Quarterly 

 Journal of Microscopical Science, Philip Henry Gosse described 

 for the first time the building-up of the tessellated tube of this 

 lovely form of rotifer, which took place under his very eyes. 

 Although nearly every writer on this form since that time quotes 

 more or less from Gosse, I am not aware that any other observer 

 has witnessed the complete operation. 



I have felt a desire to do so all my life, and have searched 

 amongst Melicertians hundreds of times, in the hope that I might . 

 be so favored, but in vain. At last, on July 26th of this year, I 

 had the ambition of my life gratified. At 10:30 a.m. I perceived 

 a young specimen busily engaged in this interesting occupation. 

 Six rows of pellets had already been completed, and the young, 

 builder was still hard at work. I watched this combination of 

 brickmaker, architect, and builder at work for five hours uninter- 

 ruptedly, which I claim was, for so small and so young an opera- 

 tor, an unparalleled feat even amongst the hard-worked mam- 

 malians. To be sure, the object, the establishment of a home,, 

 and that for a lifetime, was a noble one, and who would not vigor- 

 ously labor for such a purpose ? However, dropping reflections, 

 suffice it to say that at the expiration of these five hours the young 

 artisan rested, evidently considering "the house '^ high enough 

 for the present, and then proceeded to devote " the wheel of life '^ 

 to the acquisition of food. 



But what had been accomplished in these five hours ? Starting 

 with six rows of pellets at the time of first observation, twenty-one 

 rows more were piled up, viz., fourteen rows up to 1:30 p.m., and 

 seven more up to 3:30 p.m. These consisted, as near as I could 



