PROCEEDINGS OP SOCIETIES. 189 



transference of the granular contents to take place quite in the 

 same manner as previously referred to by Mr. Archer in one or two 

 species of Difflugia. 



Rev. E. O'Meara exhibited Surirella reniforme. 



Mr. Archer exhibited a couple of instances of the conjugated 

 state of the common and widely-distributed diatom, Stauroneis 

 phosnicenteron, the more interesting as being for the first time 

 seen seemingly in any species of that genus. The process in the 

 form shown is, however, nearly a complete parallel to the mode of 

 conjugation described by Carter for Navicula serians (' Ann. 

 Nat. Hist.,' V. XV., N.S., p. 161. PI. iv, f. 7) ; at least, this 

 might be said for it so far as could be gathered from the present 

 specimens, which were in such a condition that the process was 

 quite completed, and the so-called " sporangial frustule," more 

 properly regarded rather as simply the first ordinary frustule of a 

 new cycle, was fully formed. The main point of difference was 

 that seemingly there was but one young frustule produced, not two, 

 as in Navicula serians. Another distinction, of less importance, 

 was that the secondary coverings of the new frustule were neither 

 so numerously nor so distinctly marked by annular ribs — these 

 were much fewer than depicted by Carter, and confined to the 

 middle, the ends being without the.se transverse markings. The 

 " Caps," or hemispheres, of what ought seemingly to be called the 

 Zygospore, were present, and borne aloft, as in JST. serians, by the 

 new large young frustule. As in Navicula, the conjugating frus- 

 tules were very small, the resultant frustule evolved from the 

 Zygospore being twice the linear dimensions in every way of the 

 former. But one meets this and other forms, as is well known, of 

 many various dimensions, and the young frustules were in every 

 respect perfectly similar to all those of the same species around, save 

 in size merely. It is, perhaps, curious that this almost cosmopolitan 

 species should never before have been met with conjugated ; that 

 fact would, however, render the present specimens the more in- 

 teresting. 



Dr. Purser showed specimens of the goblet-shaped epithelial cells 

 (" Becherzellen " of the Germans) from the small intestine of the 

 cat, and he made some remarks on the structure and probable 

 function of the unicellular glands for the secretion of mucus. 



Capt. Crozier showed some elegant diatoms ; amongst others 

 Mastogloea elegans, Cymhoseira impressa, &e. 



Dr. Macalister showed Docopliorus semisignatus, a parasite of 

 the Raven. 



Mr. Archer likewise drew attention to a characteristic recent 

 specimen of the new Rhizopod, Clathridina elegans (Cienskowski), 

 showing the encysted condition as in that observer's plate, fig. 6, 

 being that state which Mr. Archer had once imagined to represent 

 a "central capsule," comparable to that of the marine Radiolaria of 

 Hackel. Mr. Archer had only once before been able to show a 

 specimen of this creature to the club, and it was not in the encysted 

 state, but with the sarcode body in the ordinary condition. 



