EAST KENT NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 35 



racters of these muscular striae is a subject deserving of further 

 research throughout the different subdivisions of the Arthropoda 

 and of the vertebrate subliingdom ; and this would be an addition 

 to the objects for a rational employment of the microscope. 



Novemler Ith, 1872. 



Habits and Economy of the Fresh-tvater Polyps. — Mr. Fullagar, 

 who has devoted much attention to these creatures in his aqua- 

 rium, read a paper on the subject, illustrated by the living speci- 

 mens and numerous instructive drawings. As it is understood 

 that these will be engraved, and published with the whole text, in 

 ' Science Gossip,' tlie present abstract wfll be very brief. The 

 spermatozoa of Hydra vulgaris were discharged in the autumn, as 

 noticed by previous observers ; but Hydra viridis discharged its 

 spermatozoa in the summer, in one instance as early as the first 

 day of June; and in this species the sperm-cells and germ-cells 

 were in the same individual. The development of the bud of 

 germ-cells took three days from its first appearance, on the lower 

 part of the body, until its separation therefrom and sinking to 

 the bottom of the vase of water. In about fifteen days there- 

 after the germs or ova were hatched in the form of minute micro- 

 scopic creatures, slowly growing, until the tentacles appeared, 

 one or two at first, and gradually increasing in number and size, 

 four only very short ones appearing at an early period of the 

 development. The author repeated his observations, made at 

 the meeting of Oct. 3rd, on the nettle-cells and parasites of the 

 Hydra, and further illustrated them by drawings. 



November 2\st, 1872. 



English Anchovies, — Mr. Gulliver gave an account of the dis- 

 tinctive characters of Engraulis encrasichlus, illustrated by spe- 

 cimens which he had lately procured during a visit to the coast of 

 South Devonshire, and with the hope that some of the members 

 of the society might be induced to look for this fish on the 

 Kentish and Sussex coasts. At Dawlish, Teignmouth, Torquay, 

 and the neighbouring fisheries, he had seen it so plentifully as to 

 raise the question, why should we not catch and cure our own 

 anchovies ? To the well-known characters by which the anchovy 

 is distinguished from the sprat, he added that in the former the 

 maxillary teeth are much larger than in the latter. And while 

 explaining that these teeth, though characteristic of our Salmonacei 

 and Clupeidae, are neither described nor depicted in some of our 

 great works of ichthyology, he added that this remarkable feature is 

 commonly ignored by our best artists ; as more fully explained in 

 the lecture on the Smelt, at the meeting of the society on January 

 18th, 1872. The teeth of the anchovy are pretty objects under 

 the microscope, and by tliem this fish may be easily distinguished, 

 even in bits of the maxillary, from the sprat. 



