136 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 
Lieberkiihn.! On the contrary, both his descriptions and figures (which 
show spores, apparently of two different species, containing faleiform 
corpuscles) justify the opposite conclusion. And Lankester? distinetly 
affirms its coccidian nature. 
Possibly, Pfeiffer? says, a form reported by Kunstler and Pitres* 
from a pleural exudate of man is perhaps referable here. But from their 
descriptions and figure it is hard to see how by any possibility it could 
belong to the Myxosporidia. The smallest spores are 18 ~ “long” and 
the largest 100 4 In such large spores it is inconceivable that the cap- 
sules could be missed, and Kunstler and Pitres appear to regard it as 
coccidian. 
Further, Pfeiffer says: 
Also relations exist with a form found in chickens by Arloing and Tripier. 
The following data will suffice’ for its rejection: 
Arloing and Tripier’ tell us that they found oval bodies with granular 
contents, a clear central nucleus, and a sort of “button” at each extrem- 
ity of the longer diameter. These bodies measure 500 to 550 jz (400 to 
450 pv, excluding the * buttons”) in length, and 200 to 220 in breadth. 
Balbiani, from an examination of hardened specimens, reserved his 
opinion, but rather believed them to be “psorosperms.” In spite of 
and after this, the authors tell us that they identified these oval bodies 
by finding identical bodies in the oviduct of a worm found imbedded in 
the same situation (cesophageal mucosa); in other words, they are the 
ova of a worm. It is hardly necessary te go further than their dimen- 
sions to exclude them from the possibility of being myxosporidian spores. 
It might, however, be added, that Balbiani would certainly have noted 
in his Lécons sur les Sporozoaires (1884) such an unprecedented anom- 
aly as the occurrence of a myxosporidian in a bird. 
I cannot, perhaps, better place the following remarks made by M. 
Armand in the way of discussion of Arloing and Tripier’s paper. M. 
Armand, in concert with Balbiani, undertook, in 1873, the inoculations 
of “psorosperms” both in warm and in cold blooded animals. The 
attempt succeeded, and several pieces showing the proliferation and 
modifications of these bodies transported into organisms very different 
from their normal habitat were obtained, and preserved in the collec- 
tion of the Laboratory of General Physiology of the Jardin des Plantes. 
As the subsequent myxosporidian literature is silent upon this point, 
it is probably safe to presume either that in this case “ psorosperms ” 
did not mean Myxosporidia, or, if it did, that the myxosporidian branch 
of the work proved barren of results. 
1 Miiller’s Archiv., 1854, pp. 1-5, pl. 1, figs. 1-19. 
2Encyclop. Britan., 9 ed., xrx, 1885, p. 855. 
3 Die Protozoen als Krankheitserreger, 1 ed., 1890, p. 49; 2 ed., 1891, p. 135. 
4Sur une psorospermie trouvée dans une humeur pleuritique; Journ. de Microgr., 
1884, vii, pp. 469-474, 520-526, pl. 11, figs. 1-15; pl. 12, figs. 1-3. 
°>Lésions organiques de nature parasitaire chez le poulet; Compt. Rend. Assoc. 
frang. Avance. Sci., 1874, 2d (Lyons) Sess., pp. 810-814. 
