10 ANIMAL PARASITES. 



cat's claws, hollow internally, and of a yellowish colour. 

 Although cut out, the animals lived nearly a whole day, and crept 

 about, extending and contracting themselves. At the conclusion 

 of this latest report, Von Siebold says that he has found every- 

 thing as Bilharz described it. 



This unfortunate parasite, in the short time that we have been 

 acquainted with it, has seen a great variety of fates, and although 

 one would have supposed that it would have been exactly investi- 

 gated when it came under the hands of a Von Siebold (and Von 

 Siebold established a new species upon it), yet its description by 

 Bilharz and Von Siebold is extraordinarily defective, so that the 

 note of interrogation which I have placed after constrict a, will 

 appear perfectly just to the unprejudiced, for whom alone I write. 

 As regards Pruner, in the first place, he has been brought in a 

 manner to a recantation with respect to the statement of size 

 (fully V}. And yet I believe that Pruner has given the size 

 correctly. In his recantation, he has forgotten that his parasite 

 had lain in water, as may be seen clearly in his account. In 

 this it was considerably dilated, and he only measured the parasite 

 in. this swollen state. Hence the different statements of this 

 author at different times as to the size of the worm. 



Von Siebold founds the distinct species, and his assertion that 

 we have not to do here with a Linguatula ferox sen Pentastomum 

 denticulatum (which is the second species of Zenker, without any 

 dispute, and was recognised as such, not only by Zenker and 

 myself, but also by Van Beneden), upon the circumstance that 

 Linguatula ferox is spined, acute at the extremity of the abdomen, 

 and smaller, but that L. constricta is not spined, obtuse at the 

 end of the abdomen, and larger. I also regard it as possible, nay, 

 even probable, that there is a peculiar species of Linguatula in 

 the South, which also attacks men ; that we have to do with a 

 peculiar immature and young state of another Linguatula. But 

 if Herr Von Siebold wishes that the unprejudiced inquirer may 

 form an opinion for himself, he should at least take care that the 

 opinion that a Linguatula ferox is referred to, should not, first of 

 all, be smuggled in under his shield. " Those are certainly my 

 hooks" (Das sindja mdne Hakeri) cried Bilharz, on reading Kauff- 

 marm's dissertation upon Pentastomum denticulatum, as Von 

 Siebold tells us in emphasised print. But then Von Siebold 

 might have stated, or have got himself informed by his pupil 

 Bilharz 1, how large the hooks are } upon which we have no 



