80 OENEBAt HISTOEY OF 



of muscular bands in the same position, passing to the centre of the 

 depressions between the lobes of the head of Floscularia campanulata, 

 and of lines of a fainter description, running up the centre of each 

 lobe, to near its apex. 



We are enabled to give an independent description of the gill-like 

 apparatus in the neck, from Mr. Gosse's admirable account of the 

 Asplanchna priodonta. He writes : "On the upper side of the 

 oviduct sits a contractile bladder, which, when full, is perfectly- 

 globular and small; being scarcely, if at all, larger than the two 

 pancreatic glands put together. Round this, attached at or near its 

 base, passes on each side, a tortuous thread, apparently glandular, 

 which goes up along each side of the ventral region, and is attached 

 to the head-mass behind the jaw-cushion. The middle part of each 

 thread is wrinkled into a large plexus of four or five pairs of doublings, 

 laid with some regularity ; on this plexus are placed four tremulous 

 tags, directed inwards ; making eight in aU. None are visible on 

 any other part of the threads. The presence of these organs, as well 

 as of the contractile bladder, in the female, shows that these are not 

 connected with impregnation. Close to each plexus there is a minute 

 orifice in the skin, set around with short setae, and a similar one is 

 placed on each side of the back, but a little higher up. From each 

 of these four apertures, a thread, floating freely in the cavity of the 

 body, goes towards the head, having, at its contact with the aperture, 

 a thickened club-shaped ganglion or gland." 



"We have assumed that this description applies to the gill-like, or 

 respiratory apparatus, of Ehrenberg, or the * water circulating system' 

 of Siebold; for to no other structures can the 'tremulous tags,' and 

 their accompanying * tortuous threads' of Gosse, in our opinion, refer. 

 Hence, if our assumption be correct, Mr. Gosse appears to believe in 

 the glandular nature, at least of the tortuous threads, of those organs, 

 and thus, in some degree, to countenance the first hypothesis of 

 Ehrenberg, respecting their glandular ofiice; the latter, however, 

 supposed them spermatic glands, or vesiculae seminales ; but as Mr. 

 Gosse remarks, they are evidently not connected with impregnation. 

 The contractile sac which Ehrenberg surmised to be spermatic, Mr. 

 Dakymple says he is convinced, from repeated observation, has no 

 relation to the generative function ; and, as we have seen, attributes 



