( 439 ) 



Proceedings of the Wernerian Natural History Society. 



(Continued from last Number, p. 215.) 



January 9. 1841. — David Falconar, Esq. in the Cliair. The Assistant- 

 Secretary read a paper by Professor Gustav Bischof, of Bonn, on the 

 employment of the Safety-Lamp> in the Coal-Mines of Germany (pub- 

 lished in this No. of the Journal, p. 378). 



Mr Goodsir exhibited a series of preparations illustrative of the Ana- 

 tomy of the Tunicated Mollusca, and demonstrated the arrangement and 

 structure of the various systems of organs in this family, alluding parti- 

 cularly to the great vascularity of all the tissues, as displayed by minute 

 injection. Pie directed the attention of the Society to one preparation 

 in particular, consisting of the test of the Phaltusia vulgaris, in which so 

 many vessels were injected that it had assumed a bright vermilion tint, 

 particularly in those places where stones, shells, or coral lines, were em- 

 bedded in, or adhered to it. Baron C'uvier had pointed out the origin 

 and trunks of these vessels, but the test itself has not generally been 

 looked upon as a highly organized structure. These preparations arc 

 deposited in the Anatomical Museum of the University. 



Notices were then read on traces cf ancient glaciers in the south of 

 Scotland, and on the occurrence of some remarkable fossil trees near 

 Manchester. 



January 23. — Professor Jameson, P. in the Chair. Mi Walter C. Tre- 

 velyan read an account of the habits of some tame Eels. In a small 

 pond in a walled garden at Craigo, the scat of David Carnegie, Esq. 

 near Montrose, these Eels have been kept for nine or ten years. They 

 lie torpid during the whole winter, except the sun be shining bright, 

 when they will occasionally come out from their hiding-place under 

 some loose stones, and sprawl about the bottom of the pond, but re- 

 fuse to take any food. The 26th April was the first day in 1840 that 

 they rose for worms, but they eat sparingly until the warm weather 

 begins, when they become quite insatiable ; one of them will then 

 swallow twenty-seven large worms one after the other. When they 

 were first put into the pond, and had no food given to them, they 

 devoured one another. They generally lie quietly at the bottom of the 

 pond, except when any of the family go and look into it, when they in- 

 stantly rise to the surface, sometimes for food, and at others merely to 

 play with the hand or take the fingers in their mouths. About the month 

 of August they become very restless, and take every opportunity of thepond 

 overflowing from rain to get out ; when sought for in the garden, on these 

 occasions, they are invariably found travelling castvarch- (the direction 

 of the sea, which is about four miles from Craigo). Towards the end of 

 August or beginning of September, they retire to their winter retreat un- 

 der the stones. Whether they breed in this pond or not is uncertain, 

 but on clearing it out last summer a few very small eels were discovered, 



