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Ijeiiiiieopndidif ; OlioiuliiU-antliidii' seem to me to dittVr much more, and Ascomyzontida" do 

 not show any real relationship. 



The authors quote and criticise at great length ail that has been written about this 

 family, but in their eagerness to exhaust the mattei-, they seem to go a little too far. They 

 give a long quotation from H. Kkoyer: JiIo)ui(ii-aJisl; Frfmstillimi af Slmjtcn Hijijioli/fc's 

 mrdislce Arfer (Kgl. Danske Vidensk. Selsk. Skrifter, Nat. Math. Afh. IX, 1842, p. 2(33— (;4)« 

 in order to prove that this excellent investigator was the first to discover an animal of this 

 family, and that his specimen belonged to the genus Choniostoma. They quote the passage 

 in Danish (p. 368—69) and in a French translation; the latter is correct, except in three 

 points, of which one may be called a very free translation, whereas the other-s are indeed 

 important mistakes and will be mentioned presently. Kroyer states that he has found a 

 specimen of HippoJyte (/ihba (from Spitzbergen) , whose carapace was much swollen on both 

 sides ; however, he found no Bopyrid in it, but about a score of sub-globular, yellowish white 

 bodies of different size (from ^/s'" to nearly IV2'" in diameter), which were lying free and 

 unconnected side by side. He supitoses tliem to be eggs of an unknown parasite and adds: 

 »the smaller ones I found filled with a yolk-like, granulous substance« [»de mindre a1' dem 

 har jeg fundet opfyldte af en aiggeblommeagtig, gryuet Masse«], which Giard and Bonnier 

 translate as follows: »Les plus petits 6taient I'emplis dune masse grenue ressemblant a des 

 oeufs«, but this gives a very different meaning from the word »yolk-like«, and may (piite 

 well be understood, as if the globules were ovisacs containing the eggs of a Choniostovia, 

 though Kroyer's expression does not imply such an idea at all. Kro3-er continues: ^In the 

 larger globules, which were probably very near maturity, I have noticed a rather long 

 (6 — 7'"), thin, vermiform body. It may be, that some leech-like animal develops itself out 

 of these eggs« [»i de sterste, som rimeligviis vare naerved Modenhed, har Jeg iagttaget et 

 tenimelig langt (6 — 7'") tyndt, ormedannet Legeme. Maaske udvikler dei- sig altsaa af 

 disse iEg et igleagtigt Dyr«]. Judging from the two sizes indicated by Kriiyei-, we might 

 suppose that the larger globules were females, the smaller ones ovisacs of a Choniosfoma, 

 but it seems to me very improbable, that a luxturalist like Kroyer should not have seen 

 that the small globules in reality contained eggs or larvse, instead of supposing their 

 contents to be a yolk-like, granulous substance, and his statement that he found a \ermiform 

 body about 13 — 15 millini. in length in the large globules, must in my opinion do away with 

 any idea that it could be the female of a Choniostoma (comp. my description of this genus 

 later on). But then, how sliall we explain tliat Giard and Bonnier could advance sucli an 

 opinion? Well, in their trans]ati(jn of Kroyer's description of the contents of the large 

 globules, they translate the first woi-ds: / de .storste« [>/« the larger ones«l by: »pres des 

 plus gros' which gives quite a ditferent meaning, allowing this remarkable, vermifoiin l)ody 

 to be taken for a free animal belonging to another class. Thus two faults in their trans- 

 lation of Kroyer lead them to find a similarity whicli does not really exist between a Cho- 

 nioKfomit with its ovisacs and Kriiyer's description. 1 am iinahlc lo t<'ll whal tiic objects 



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