CRUSTACEANS 



An interest in this branch of zoology cannot be traced back to a remote 

 past in the annals of this county. The Description of Leicester Shire, by William 

 Burton, in 1622, takes no notice of its invertebrate fauna. A Topographical 

 History of the County of Leicester, by the Rev. J. Curtis, published in 1831, is 

 equally neglectful. The introduction includes an article on botany, contri- 

 buted by ' Three Loughborough botanists, Mr. Thomas Hands, Joseph Paget, 

 Esq., and Mr. William Parkinson.' 1 This article begins by saying, ' Leices- 

 tershire, comprehending within its boundaries, hills, valleys, and plains, 

 alluvial and secondary strata, bogs, marshes, cultivated and waste ground, 

 together with woods of every aspect, is peculiarly rich in its botany.' * There 

 follows a very long list of plants, among which are several pond weeds, these 

 and other circumstances of the description justifying the inference that this 

 county will eventually be found as well supplied with land and freshwater 

 crustaceans as most of our purely inland shires. At length, in 1886, we find 

 one of the species more or less definitely mentioned. A Report of the 

 Leicester Literary and Philosophical Society says : 



Mr. Garnar exhibited specimens of the small crustacean Asellus aquaticus, common at the 

 bottom of ponds, and in which the circulation of the internal fluid was very distinctly seen 

 under the microscope. He read an account of this animal extracted from several works, 

 but stated that the principal work upon the subject was in French, and was not procurable 

 in Leicester. 3 



It is not expressly stated where the specimens were found, but, as they were 

 alive, no doubt they came from the immediate neighbourhood of Leicester 

 itself. The French work alluded to is the Histoire Naturelle des Crustaces 

 d'Eau douce de Norvege, published in 1867, by the distinguished Norwegian 

 professor, G. O. Sars. In 1894 a paper on 'the Leicestershire brooks,' by 

 Mr. Mott, chairman of the society just mentioned, contains the calculation 

 that there are about 450 distinct streams in the county, and about 160 species 

 of plants to which their existence is essential, besides a small number of 

 vertebrate animals, and a large number of invertebrates. 4 In the year 1900 

 Mr. F. W. Rowley, giving his inaugural address to the zoological section of 

 the same society, made the following pertinent remarks : 



I may say that when I and Mr. Elliott arranged excursions to the reservoirs at Swithland, 

 Cropston, and Thornton, it was really with a desire to interest some of the members in a 

 branch of our work almost untouched and with a peculiar fascination of its own. For, 

 indeed, our ditches, ponds, and reservoirs teem with material for study, and study of a 

 serious kind ; the forms of life which we meet with have not served their purpose, as some 

 would seem to think, when they have been utilized to compel admiration at a soiret. On 

 the contrary they present problems for solution which tax to the utmost the abilities of the 

 most acute and skilful observers. 



Further on he says : 



On the zoological side, Mr. Garnar has for some years made a special study of the 

 Entomostraca, and I hope that he will at no distant date consent to let us have his results 

 for publication in the Transactions. 5 



1 Op. cit. p. vii. * Ibid. p. xxxv. 3 The Midland Naturalist, ix (1886). 



4 Trans. Leic. Lit. and Phil. Sue. iii, 399. ' Ibid, v, 504 (1900). 



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