Miscellaneous. 297 



The genus differs from Fiingia in having the spaces on the inter- 

 costal grooves and the bars of the sj'napticuhe regular. 



Some small corals lately brought from the Korean Sea have the 

 shape, synapticulate arrangement, and bifurcating costce of Micra- 

 bacia : but the corallum resembles in its bipartite unsymmetrical 

 growth the genus Dioseris of the Lophoserinae. 



Micrahacia Fittoni, described by the author in 1866, from the 

 Gault, is placed in the same genus as 31. coronula with much 

 doubt. The type has been mislaid, and the figures exhibit charac- 

 ters some of which resemble those of M. coronula ; but in the 

 absence of the specimen, it is not quite certain what are the struc- 

 tures represented. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 



On the Copulation o/Difflugia globulosa, Duj. 

 By Dr. Carl F. Jickeli. 



CoPULATiojT and conjugation have been but rarely observed in 

 the Rhizopoda, and of the few statements relating to the subject 

 some are susceptible of a different interpretation. Especially 

 since the well-known observation of A. Gruber * upon the process 

 of division in Eiufh/pha alveolata, man}- of these statements may 

 justly be regarded with doubt. For this reason I may here describe 

 a process of c3pulation in Diffiuijia glohidosa which I observed at 

 Jena in December of last year. 



One morning I found in a watch-glass, in which I was breeding 

 Infusoria and Rhizopoda, two specimens of the Diflagia united. 

 The animalcules clung together by the mouth-openings. Their 

 carapaces were entirelj^ filled with protoplasm, and further four 

 very long pseudopodia, unusually lively in their movements, issued 

 from the point of union of the two individuals. The carapaces 

 were of equal size, but one of them much more transparent than 

 the other. When the creatures were isolated by moans of a fine 

 pipette they still remained united. About the same time in the 

 morning of the following day, therefore four-and-twenty hours 

 later, the two animalcules were still united, and both carapaces 

 were quite filled with protoplasm ; but the action of the pseudo- 

 podia had ceased, and at the point of union of the two mouth- 

 apertures not the smallest plasmatic thread was to be detected. 

 Examination at the end of another twelve hours, or thirty-six 

 hours after the first observation, showed no alteration, but the two 

 carapaces remained, as in the morning, fully occupied by proto- 

 plasm without the least trace of pseudopodia. Twelve hours later 



* Zeitschr. i. vnsa. Zool. 1881. 

 Ann. ds Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 5. Vol xiv. 23 



