TOL. XIII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. ()03 



cannot but think that they live also. But they are only the joints or pieces 

 broken off from the latus, and when they are voided in the stools, are a sure 

 sign of a jointed worm. And the cure must accordingly be adapted. But that 

 all these single joints whilst in the body do live, besides those considerations I 

 have already delivered to prove that in every joint there is a mouth for receiv- 

 ing the food, (and no doubt answerable organs for the digestion and distribu- 

 tion of it) I am the farther induced to believe, because it has been often ob- 

 served by myself and others, that both single joints and oftener larger pieces 

 have been voided alive, and where vast quantities of this worm too have been 

 voided at the same time; in abundance of pieces, I have observed them almost 

 equally turgid, and alike filled with chyle, in proportion to the magnitude of 

 the parts. Now I cannot think that in voiding, it can always be broken into so 

 many pieces; and if it be done sometime before, and they lie dead in the body, 

 they must be macerated, and different from what they appear. But that ob- 

 servation, I have already often mentioned of that worm I met with in the dog 

 I dissected in the college theatre, furnishes me with something apposite to our 

 purpose. For here about the middle of the worm, as it lay in the intestine, 

 about a foot and a half from the tail, or lower extremity, I observed 2 single 

 joints, about 4 of an inch long, that were alive, and which continued their mo- 

 tion briskly for ^ of an hour, or more in warm water. That these were broken 

 off from the tail, I have no doubt, being in all respects so like them. And 

 that it must be done some time before, I am apt to think, because they were 

 so remote from it; for they could not otherwise easily, being but single joints, 

 make so great an advance, being on all occasions liable rather to be driven down, 

 not being able, as I could observe, any ways to fasten themselves, and so resist 

 the force of the descending faeces. Which is the reason when broken off, that 

 they are so frequently voided. 



Upon the whole, I have been sometimes apt to think what analogy there 

 may be between this jointed worm and knotted plants, of which each joint 

 can so easily propagate itself. And whether it may not be thought a plarit- 

 animal, or zoophyton, bred in animal bodies, since so large and frequent de- 

 truncations of the body do not destroy the life of the whole. Which I think 

 can scarcely be instanced in any animal besides.* 



The Explanation of the Figures. 



PI. ig^ fig. 1, represents that worm, or rather part of a worm, voided by 

 a young man in London, 8 yards long, which I still keep by me. The less 

 extreme is that part towards the head, the broader, the tail. The protuberances 

 about the middle of the edges of the joints, are the orifices I take for mouths. 



* The hydra and other of the polypus-tribe were at this time unknown, 



4 H 2 



