484; Bihliographical Notice. 



Dr. Meinert explains by the supposition that the vagina has been 

 placed behind the sixth instead of behind the eighth ventral shield ; and 

 he considers certain chitinized parts between the vagina and anus as 

 the vestiges of the reduced seventh and eighth ventral shields, the 

 lateral parts being more clearly discernible than the central ones. 

 Of course the dorsal parts of these segments must be similarly re- 

 duced. The two triangular plates which Mr. Westwood explains 

 as the bifid last ventral shield are explained in the same way by 

 Dr. Meinert, who counts them as the ninth ventral. They are to 

 be found not only in the female, where Mr. Westwood discovered 

 them, but also in the male, partly hidden by the ventral shield of the 

 eighth segment. This view diifers from that of all other authors, 

 also from that of Lacaze-Duthiers, whose whole account is vitiated by 

 the strange mistake of counting seven whole segments in front of 

 the vagina, whereas there are only six. Duthiers's last dorsal shield, 

 ** endecato-tergite," first observed by Leon Dufour, is, according to 

 Meinert (who proposes to call it the " anal " plate, and recommends it 

 for the distinction of species), only a chitinized part of the membrane 

 extending between the roots of the forceps ; it consists of two parts. 

 The Latin resume at the end of this paper contains the results of 

 the author's careful investigation of the sexual organs of the male, 

 and there is also a Latin explanation of the plate which illustrates 

 their structure. 



M. Mdrch's revision of Serpulidse has been occasioned by, and is 

 in fact a kind of necessary supplement to his paper on Vermetidse 

 (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1861-18G2). The similarity between the shells 

 is so great that hardly any character can be considered uncondition- 

 ally reliable for their distinction. Dentalium has an anal orifice, as 

 well as any Annelid; and though the opaque cretaceous shells of most 

 Serpulid{3e may be easily distinguishable from the internally smooth 

 and shining shells of most Vermetidse, the semitransparent shells of 

 several species of PlacosteguSy Bitrypa, and Spirorbis have a parallel 

 in that o^ Siphonium Gcederopi, at least in young specimens. Neither 

 sculpture, nor shape, nor colour distinguishes the shells sufficiently 

 well, nor does the assumed constant absence of internal transverse 

 divisions ; for they are, as Professor Steenstrup has shown, to be met 

 with in Spirobranchus — only in this latter they are perforated, and 

 are soon destroyed when a new one has been formed, so that not more 

 than one is observable at a time. One hundred and thirty-four species 

 are described in Latin, amongst which several new ones, besides a new 

 genus, Phragmatopomay of the family of Hermellse, which has been 

 described here because it shows some analogy to Serpulidse, and 

 seems to exhibit a transition from the type ot one group to that of 

 another. The paper is accompanied with a very beautiful plate. 



In conclusion, a few words may be said on Dr. Bergh's papers, of 

 which the first describes a new genus of Dendronotidae, which he 

 proposes to call Campaspe piisilla, differing from Dendronotus prin- 

 cipally by the trunks of the dorsal papillae and the sheaths of the 

 rhinophores being but slightly subdivided, as well as by its teeth. To 

 this is appended an anatomical description of Do^o, showing, amongst 



