180 



through the microscope, displayed hundreds of minute worms in 

 lively motion. When these worms had become perfectly dry, and 

 apparently entirely lifeless, they again recovered upon being moist- 

 ened with a drop of water, and were as lively as before. 



To determine the origin of these animals, Mr. Bauer undertook a 

 series of experiments, which convinced him that the spawn or eggs 

 were conveyed into the cavities of the germens by the circulating 

 sap. In these experiments he inserted some of the worms into sound 

 grains of wheat, suffered them to germinate, and found the worms 

 ia different stages of their growth in the stalk, and ultimately in the 

 germens. 



The largest of these worms was one fourth of an inch long, and 

 one eightieth of an inch in diameter ; their head is armed with a 

 moveable proboscis, and the tail ends in a claw-like point ; at a small 

 distance from which, on the inferior side, is an orifice, from which 

 they discharge their eggs in strings of five or six, adhering to each 

 other. Each egg is about -s^th of an inch long, and -g-o-irth, or -s-i-oth 

 in diameter ; and if attentively examined, they are transparent enough 

 to allow of the young worm being seen within, which, in about an 

 hour and a half after the egg is laid, extricates itself. These worms 

 exhibit no external distinctions of sex, and the author considers them 

 to be hermaphrodites. 



The first specimens of these worms which Mr. Bauer examined, 

 were from grains twelve months old, and consequently perfectly dry. 

 He. however, also succeeded in recovering them by immersion in 

 water, from wheat which had been kept five years and eight months ; 

 but the longer the specimens were kept, the longer were the worms 

 obliged to be immersed in water, to enable them to recover their 

 muscular motions. The longest period of its suspension which he 

 had observed, was six years and one month ; after that time they 

 seemed perfectly dead. 



Alternately moistened and dried in a watch-glass, these worms 

 might be preserved alive for several weeks ; and if kept continually 

 moist, they remained alive for three months ; but if dried at the end 

 of that period, they do not again recover, but become quite straight, 

 and remain unaltered in the water for more than fourteen months, 

 when they gradually decay. Their extraordinary preservation, and 

 these various circumstances, Mr. Bauer refers to the mucous-like water 

 in which they are enveloped, and which appears to be of an oily na- 

 ture. 



The author concludes this paper with an abstract of the description 

 of these worms given by other writers, and of their opinions respect- 

 ing their origin. 



On Metallic Titanium. By W. H. Wollaston, M.D. V.P.R.S. Read 

 December 12, 1822. [Phil. Trans. 1823,;?. 17.] 



Small cubic crystals are occasionally met with in the slag of iron 

 furnaces, which, from being imbedded in sulphuret of iron, have been 



