THe Microscope. 271 
commence to understand how most of the cells are destined to 
an early death. This great loss is replaced by the formation of 
new cells and by the division of those already formed,—the nu- 
cleus dividing first, then the whole cell becoming separated into 
two by constriction. 
In order to understand the most complex we study the most 
simple. That we may the better understand the highest, we 
watch the lowest, for they all receive new material and trans- 
form it into the constituents of their own bodies. They live, 
they grow, they reproduce their kind, they die. 
THE PARASITE IN “CHICKEN GAPKS.” 
At alate meeting of the Buffalo Microscopical Society, Dr. 
Walker, of Franklinville, detailed the results of some experi- 
ments upon “the gape worm of fowls.” 
“The disease among poultry called the gapes was first 
described by Dr. Wiesenthall of Baltimore in 1797, subsequently 
by the English naturalist, George Montagu, in 1808. Both 
recognized a small worm in the trechea as the cause of the 
disease. In 1879 Lord Walsingham of England offered a prize 
of $500 for the most complete life history of the parasite causing 
the gapes. Dr. Pierre Megnin, a noted French naturalist, 
received the award. He supposed no intermediate host was 
required, but the parasite was developed in the fowl from pick- 
ing up the eggs scattered upon the ground or the embryos after 
they were hatched in water. Before the present investigation 
was begun, a little more than one year ago, it was generally 
supposed some intermediate host was required, but what that 
was no one had any definite idea. That the earthworm is the 
original host is proved by eight separate experiments with as 
many different chicks, by feeding them earthworms from a 
locality where chickens had the gapes. In every instance the 
gapes was produced in a little less thanseven days. The earth- 
worms were examined and the parasite found coiled up in the 
structure of the worm in the same manner as trichin& are coiled 
up in their cysts. That all earthworms do not contain the 
parasite was proved by feeding chickens earthworms from a 
locality where they did not have the gapes. The disease was 
