CASH ON THE ROTIFERA. l9§ 



sliell. I transferred them to a box, with some cotton wool in it, kept 

 them in my pocket the rest of the day, and kept them in the box from 

 this (Friday) forenoon until late on the following Monday evening, when I 

 got home ; they were then transferred to a tumbler of water, with a little 

 Anacharis in it, and they seemed as lively and fresh as if they had been 

 but an hour caught. They moved about rapidly, and with a peculiar con- 

 tinuous gliding motion over the sides of the glass, sailing on steadily, so 

 to speak, without any of the jerking mode of progression so common in 

 most of the gasteropods. They gradually died off, one surviving a fort- 

 night; but during the time that I had an opportunity of observing them 

 in captivity, I never could discover any portion of the mantle expanded 

 over the shell. I paid particular attention to this, as Mr. Jeffreys, in his 

 valuable work on British Conchology, states that Dr. Percival Wright in- 

 formed him " that the greater part of the shell in this species is covered 

 by the mantle, as in L. glutimsa," while from a remark of Professor Good- 

 sir, which he quotes, he says, " it might be inferred that the mantle has 

 not the expanded lobe which is peculiar to the sub-genus Amphipepla." 

 It is highly desirable that some more accurate observations should be 

 made on this point. Mine cannot be called accurate, for I was unable 

 properly to see the animal in its native habitat, as I before stated ; and it 

 is very probable that its mantle may have been retracted when I put it 

 into a tumbler containing such an uncongenial element as pure water, 



Bradford, Yorkshire^ Oct, Sth, 1864. 



NOTES ON THE EOTIFERA. 



By J. Cash, WARRiNaxoN. 



No. 3. — The Floscules. 



Some of the animalcules to which the name of Rotifera has been 

 applied are not aptly designated. The characters of the order depend, not 

 so much upon the presence of a rotary organ, (for in some species, such 

 as those we are about to consider, as well as the Stephanoceros, no such 

 organ is visible,) as upon certain internal features of organisation. Great 

 difference of opinion seems to exist among naturalists as to the ran)*: 



