CHAPTER XXII. 



STRONGYLUS DOUGLASSII. 



This is the name that Dr. Spencer Cobbold, our greatest 

 living authority on " Entozoa " (Internal Parasites) 

 has given to the small worm which I discovered 

 two years ago, inhabiting in countless numbers the 

 stomach of the Ostrich, and which is a totally new 

 worm to science. 



Two years ago I was struck with the similarity of 

 the symptoms described in the birds that had been 

 dying so much in the western province, in the midland 

 districts, and a few that had commenced to die in the 

 eastern districts, and I seized the first opportunity that 

 oftered of making a post-mortem examination of some 

 birds that were supposed to be dying of stop-sickness, 

 when the cause was soon discovered to be these worms 

 being in swarms in the inner folds of the stomach, and 

 especially on that part which contains the gastric 

 glands ; so that the whole of the gastric juices, without 

 which no digestion can go on, were being consumed by 

 them, and the glands themselves seriously injured. 



The worm is about a quarter of an inch long, it buries 



