13 
scopical material, especially Diatomaceae, was present in great abundance. The 
sponge was beautifully clean, of a bright, buff color, a small piece or perhaps 
a separate sponge the size of a small hickory nut being attached to every 
frond of the Utricularia. After obtaining as much of this as we could care 
for, besides other material, we started up the river, passing through lakes 
Pistakee and Nippersink into Fox Lake, resting for the night at “Hotel Sayles,” 
situate on Hickory Point, the dividing ridge between Lake Nippersink and 
Fox Lake. The following morning we found only some Diatomaceous material, 
and soon pushed off in the direction of Cedar Lake, which is about four 
miles from our hotel and two miles from Fox Lake. Here the wind, from an 
approaching storm, so ruffied the water as to make all attempts at collecting 
futile. On our return to the neighborhood of the hotel we succeeded in find- 
ing a large quantity of Spongilla lacustris, which well repaid us for the disap- 
pointment in the earlier part of the day. 
This sponge, unlike the former, was of a bright emerald green, growing 
in long digitate processes and branches, attached to weeds or stones in about 
three feet of water. Nothing could exceed the beauty of this sponge seen 
growing in the sunshine when the water was quite still. The vital action 
of the sponge could be seen, causing the gentle waving motion which is de- 
seribed as occurring in marine sponges. Had we made this gathering six 
weeks later in the season it would have been a real treasure, the statoblasts, 
which are now few, would by that time have been present in great abundance. 
The same party has made several excursions to the streams and sloughs south 
of Chicago. In the Calumet River, at Blue Island, fragments of sponges and 
some rare algae were found. The sponges consisted of Meyenia fluviatilis and 
Spongilla lacustris, while the algae most noticeable were fine specimens of 
Chara and Nitella. These, for want of large jars, could not be preserved. In 
1883 and in 1886 we visited the Cummins Bridge, over the Calumet River near 
Calumet Lake, and on both occasions were well rewarded with rich gather- 
ings of sponges, Diatomaceae and other microscopic objects. Among these was 
a quantity of the Polyzoan Jdae, the winter eggs of which are similar in physio- 
logical history to the statoblasts of the fresh-water sponge. Among the sponges 
found was Meyenia fluviatilis, one peculiar variety of which was described and 
named some five years ago by Mr. B. W. Thomas as Meyenia calumetica; a 
small piece of Heteromeyenia argyrosperma, Potts; Carterius tubisperma, Mills; 
Carterius latitenta, Potts, and a variety of Heteromeyenia repens, Potts; also 
a variety of Spongilla fragilis, Leidy, including one known as Spongilla fragilis 
variety Calumeti. 
These statements are made with the hope that they will encourage others 
of like tastes and inclinations to make further search in this neglected, but 
interesting branch of study. = 
I know of no more promising field of research for the naturalist, whether 
for sponges, diatoms or other microscopical material, than the chain of small 
lakes and swamps in McHenry County, and the region extending from ten 
to thirty miles south and southwest of Chicago. 
It is practically certain that some of the specimens which were identi- 
fied in the above report as Meyenia fluviatilis or one of its varieties, were 
actually Ephydatia miilleri, but there is considerable probability that E. 
fluviatilis was also represented. 
Asteromeyenia radiospiculata is reported from Granite City, Illinois, 
by Annandale in a brief paper (1911) in which he created the genus 
Asteromeyenia to receive two North American species which have radi- 
ate dermal spicules, and gemmule spicules of two or more distinct classes. 
Sponges collected by R. E. Richardson, and others, in the Illinois 
River at various locations, in connection with certain investigations of the 
