78 Miscellaneous. 



tural family (Rosacece). A Potentilla, which had for some years been 

 a favourite plant from its great luxuriance of growth and bloom, 

 played in that year, without removal or any alteration of treatment, 

 the following strange antics. As usual it grew luxuriantly and was 

 covered with bud, but it did not bear a single true flower through- 

 out the season. Every flower on the plant, without exception, — and 

 none died oflr, — opened into a tuft of small regular green leaves : it 

 was not a mere whorl of leaves for the petals, but, there being no 

 stamens or pistils, the whole apparatus of the flower was replaced by 

 green leaves of small size in a thick tuft. Sometimes a second would 

 grow, smaller, from the centre of the first flower, but it presented 

 the same aspect. All these leaves were of the same colour and cha- 

 racter as the ordinary leaf of Potentilla. 



I was much interested in observing this plant, and watched it the 

 next spring, but it died after this unnatural effort. 



If you think either of the above facts worth recording, you are 

 welcome to them. 



I am, my dear Sir, very faithfully yours, 



J. TouLMiN Smith. 



W. Francis, Esq. 



Descriptions of two new species of Planaria. By Joseph Leidy, M.D. 



Planaria maculata. Superiorly convex, faintly blackish or brown- 

 ish with irregular colourless maculae ; inferiorly flat, colourless ; an- 

 teriorly trapezoidal ; posteriorly spatulate or oval ; eyes two, anterior, 

 proximate, composed of a large semitransparent mass with a reni- 

 form mass of pigmentum nigrum at the postero-internal part ; oral 

 aperture ventral, one third the length of the body from the postericM" 

 extremity; proboscis large and cylindrical. Length 2^ lines ; breadth -i- 

 line. Found in moderate abundance in the ditches below the city, 

 creeping upon the submerged stems of aquatic plants. 



Subgenus. Prostoma, Duges. Mouth anterior and terminal. 



Prostoma marginatum. Blackish, narrow lanceolate, anteriorly trun- 

 cate ; marginate, margin delicately striate ; mouth large ; proboscis 

 large and oblong ; eyes two, anterior, distant, each consisting of two 

 round masses of pigmentum nigrum in contact with each other, and 

 of which one is larger than the other ; generative orifice one-fourth 

 the length of the body from the posterior extremity. Length 1 line. 

 A single specimen found with the preceding, but jjrobably not rare ; 

 for, from its small size, it escaped my notice while collecting some of 

 the former, and it was not until I got home that I detected its exist- 

 ence in the vessel of water containing the others. 



The anatomy of P. maculata does not differ from that of Planaria 

 lactea, as given by Duges in the ' Annales des Sciences Naturelles.' 

 In Prostoma marginatum the digestive cavity has not the dendritic ar- 

 rangement of Planaria, htxt merely consists of a large capacious sac 

 extending as far back as the ^^ostcrior third of the body, and having a 

 caecum upon each side of the proboscis. The penis has a yellow 

 colour, and consists of a round granular mass, with a moderately long 



