FIJI-NEW ZEALAND EXPEDITION 277 
the animal is disturbed. On such occasions Peripatus raises the 
anterior part of the body and, from a blunt, hollow, wart-like 
projection on either side of the head, ejects with considerable 
force, a harmless but very sticky substance which is the product 
of the slime glands within the body. This secretion is also of use 
to the animal in entangling its prey. 
‘* After leaving the oral papillz the clear fluid hardens into a 
series of viscous stands bearing, at fairly regular intervals, minute 
droplets. Although harmless, it is very sticky, coming away easily 
from the animal itself but adhering tenaciously to other objects 
including one’s fingers. I can not agree with Hutton’s statement 
(Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., XVIII, 362, 1876) that ‘‘This viscid fluid 
is for offensive and not defensive purposes,’’ for in my experience 
it was certainly used in a defensive capacity. And I do not doubt 
that a spray of this fluid would, to say the least, prove very dis- 
concerting to any enemy such as spiders or predaceous beetles, 
both of which live in the same situations as Peripatus. In 95% 
alcohol the slime collects in the form of a floceulent mass.’” 
Of the several interesting internal structures which particularly 
relate Peripatus to the insects, the most important is the system 
of tubules or trachee which open to the exterior through minute 
pores scattered irregularly over the skin. These tubules carry air 
directly to the different parts of the animal’s interior. 
Possibly in his search the collector will now and then come 
across a little grayish fellow one-fourth to one-half inch long, an 
exact miniature of the adult animal. This young one, along with 
perhaps fifteen or twenty brothers and sisters, had been brought 
forth alive a few weeks previously by a sleek and well-fed female. 
With the assistance of Mr. Hamilton and Miss Castle of the 
Dominion Museum and of Mrs. Stoner I was able to secure, in 
two one-half day trips to Wilton’s Bush, over one hundred speci- 
mens of Peripatus; and since it is not the good fortune of many 
people to see the animal, which is a never-failing source of in- 
terest to the layman as well as to the naturalist, this lot is of 
more than passing concern. 
In the Orthoptera more than seventy-five species are recorded 
from the Dominion. One finds the usual number of grasshoppers, 
locustids, crickets and stick-insects included in the list. 
The large, black, brachyelytrous cockroach (Blatta forticeps) 
7 Stoner, Dayton, collecting Peripatus in New Zealand, Science, LVIII, No. 
1505, 342, 1923. 
