Note on Perich?ota iiidica. 397 



exhibited the worms at a meeting of the Zoological Society, 

 under the name of P. indica. 



The house I find these worms in is a plant stove, where 

 the temperature seldom falls lower than 65°, and the place 

 where they are most plentiful is in a bed of soil in which 

 plants are growing. Underneath this bed are hot-water 

 pipes, so that the soil is always at a higher average 

 temperature than the air of the house. Here the worms 

 seem to thrive very w^ell, as they are met with in all stages. 

 Their casts appear to be quite distinctive, being of finer 

 mould — if one may use the term — and the casts are thrown 

 farther from the mouth of the boring than is the case with 

 other worms. They are extremely quick in their movements, 

 and when handled wrioole more after the manner of an eel 

 or reptile than what we are familiar with in any of our 

 indigenous species. 



Looking to the fact that there has been no communication 

 between Cally and our place such as would have conveyed 

 earthworms, and that each place, so to speak, has received 

 these worms independently, there can be little doubt they 

 are of general distribution in Britain. A general search in 

 hothouses kept at high temperatures would, I am confident, 

 confirm this opinion. 



Mr Fergusson sends me the following note of his experience 

 with these worms at Cally House : — " I first noticed these 

 worms shortly after I came here in the summer of 1881 

 in our stoves, my attention being first drawn to them by 

 their very lively movements when thrown out of the flower- 

 pots. I knew at once they were something rare, as I had 

 never come across them before, though I had a long experi- 

 ence in different parts of the three kingdoms. I showed 

 them to all my naturalist friends as curiosities, but could get 

 no information about them. Last year I sent some of them 

 to my friend Mr Campbell, of Kelvingrove Museum, but they 

 were new to him, and he sent some to the British Museum, 

 where they appeared to be also unknown. I am very 

 pleased to get them identified now. They are found in all 

 our houses where we keep up a temperature of 60°, but never 

 in any of the cooler houses ; and though flower-pots in which 



