PKOCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. 41 



tical importance, and one to which the stndy of niicroscopists may be 

 profitably directed. 



After noticing Peronosjjora infestans, the cause of the potato 

 disease, the Yeast plant, and some others, he concluded by showing 

 what the microscope had done for Fungology, and how much remained 

 to be done. 



In 1818, Dr. Withering described 564 species of fungi, few of 

 which were microscoj)ic. There are now 2479 species enumerated, 

 and there are nearly one-foiu'th more species of fungi than all British 

 flowering plants together. All these, he said, had been rescued from 

 obscui'ity and confusion by the microscope, as most of the specific and 

 often generic characters depended on peculiarities discoverable only 

 by this instrument. 



With a passing allusion to the Germ Theory of disease, he in- 

 vited the members to direct their attention to the wide field of 

 discovery open to them, promising to all an immediate reward in the 

 new forms of beauty and wonder which would be revealed to them, 

 and to the ambitious a favourable opportunity for acquiring distinc- 

 tion. 



Mr. Chantrell read a communication on the (Ecistes crystallinus, 

 the result of a correspondence he had had with Mr. Henry Davis, 

 F.E.M.S., and the author of a paper " On Two New Species of the 

 Genus (Ecistes, Class Eotifera." 



In the Eeport of the Proceedings of the February Meeting of the 

 Liverpool Microscopical Society, which appeared in the ' Monthly 

 Microscopical Journal ' for Ai)ril, it was stated by mistake that Mr. 

 Chantrell had found in the Windsor pond, at an earlier period " Ste- 

 phanoceros Eichornii, Melicerta ringens, (Ecistes longicornis, and 

 Cothurnia imberbis," whereas it should have said, all Mr. Eichter's 

 specimens had been foimd, with the exception of the above named. 

 [For which the reporter is alone to blame.] 



The mention of the (Ecistes longicornis being found, led Mr. 

 Davis to make inquiry of Mr. Chantrell about this rare species, as 

 also about the unknown " beautiful rotifer :" the mistake was exjilained, 

 and sketches of this latter rotifer sent, as also of young ones, and sub- 

 sequently some live specimens. Mr. Davis's first impression was that 

 it was a variety of Limnias ceratophylli, perhaps identical with 

 fig. 1 in his paper, called (Ecistes {infermedias) solely to suit 

 Ehrenberg's classification, but he thought then and knows now that 

 it is a Limnias scarcely distinct from L. ceratophylli ; plate 36, fig. 2, 

 in Pritchard, is from one of Mr. Gosse's early drawings, and is very 

 incorrect ; his later figure in ' Evenings at the Microscope ' is far 

 better. Limnias seem very subject to variation, the common form of 

 disk is double, but specimens may be taken with the constriction, 

 slight to another variation is in the antennae, these being mere pim- 

 ples developed to respectable horns in others. The young (Ecistes, 

 when seen laterally, are very like the illustration in Pritchard, 

 minus the antennte or horns. Mr. Davis was under the impression 

 that Mr. Chantrell had left out the tubes in his sketches a and b, as 

 the tubes would have assisted him in the identification of the species. 



