33 



Remarks on the Glossiphonid^, a Family of Discophorous 

 Annulata. By the Rev. W. Houghton, M.A., F.L.S. 



I AM induced to offer a few remarks on the above-named 

 family, in the hopes of drawing the attention of microscopists 

 to the structure and development of a small group of animals 

 which appear to have been almost neglected by British 

 naturalists, and although I have nothing to add to what M. 

 Grube has published in his valuable memoir on the develop- 

 ment of these animals — for he appears to have almost exhaust- 

 ed the subject, while the researches of De Filippi, Miiller, 

 &c., have acquainted us with much that relates to their struc- 

 ture and habits — yet, perhaps, as the members which com- 

 pose this family are but little known, these few remarks will 

 not be deemed altogether superfluous. 



With the exception of some observations of the late Dr. 

 Rawlins Johnson and a few incidental remarks on some of 

 the species of this family in the* pages of the ' Annals and 

 Magazine of Natural History,^ all that we know of the 

 Glossiphonidae is derived from the works of Grube, De Filippi, 

 O. F. Miiller, F. Miiller, and Moquin-Tandon. I can hardly 

 speak in too high praise of Grube^s memoir ('Untersuchungen 

 iiber die Entwickelung der Clepsinen,^ Konigsburg, 184;4) . 

 Having taken up the subject of the development of these 

 Annelids before I had seen the memoir above named, I am 

 able, from independent observation, to confirm almost every 

 point which that naturalist has advanced. 



The late Dr. Rawlins Johnson, of Bristol, was the first to 

 establish on satisfactory grounds the genus Glossiphonia and 

 to separate it from that of Hirudo, under which genus it had 

 been, since the time of Linnaeus, generally comprised ; this 

 was in 1816, but, strangely enough, in the following year this 

 writer altered the very appropriate name of Glossiphonia into 

 that of Glossipora, without any improvement in the term 

 proposed ; it is, however, but fair that one of these names 

 should be allowed to stand in preference to the ambiguous 

 one of Clepsine, proposed by Savigny in 1827, although this 

 latter term, in violation of the acknowledged laws of zoological 

 nomenclature, has been generally adopted. The Glossiphonidae 

 are all inhabitants of fresh water, although Mr. Gosse, in his 

 ' Manual of Marine Zoology,' has erroneously admitted one 

 species, G. rachana, W. Thompson, into the catalogue of 

 marine worms. 



The genus contains the following British species: — G. biocu- 

 lata, G. complanata, G. hyalina, G. verrucata, G. tessulata, 



