86 Mr. H. N. Moseley on Peripatus novse-zealandise. 



statements concerning the structure of Peripatus which are at 

 variance with my own observations, and, indeed, with zoolo- 

 gical probability, that it cannot be allowed to pass without 

 comment. 



I described various points in the structure of Peripatus 

 capensis^ in a paper in the Phil. Trans. Roy. Soc. vol. clxiv. 

 1874, p. 757, confining my remarks to those particulars which 

 seemed to have been missed or erroneously described by 

 former observers ; and I further described the development of 

 the species. 



The points of chief interest which I determined, and which 

 were new to science, were : — 



1. T^\idit Peripatus was a tracheate. 



2. That the tracheal openings were diffused over the body- 

 surface, not confined to certain restricted regions only, as in 

 all other tracheates. 



3. That the animal was not hermaphrodite, but that the 

 sexes were separate. 



4. That the supposed testis of Grube was a slime-secreting 

 gland, the mode of use of which was explained. 



5. That Peripatus was viviparous, and that its horny jaws 

 were foot-jaws, homologous with those of Arthropods and not 

 with those of Annelids. 



Captain Hutton, who unfortunately had access to the 

 abstract of my paper only, as will be seen by reference to his 

 paper, confirms some of my points by his investigations of 

 P. novce-zealandice^ but comes to the extraordinary results that 

 this closely related species is not unisexual but hermaphrodite, 

 and that the horny jaws are not foot-jaws, but homologous 

 with those of Annelids. 



When H.M.S. 'Challenger' was at Wellington, Mr. 

 W. T. L. Travers, who has done so much for science in New 

 Zealand, and who first drew Captain Hutton's attention to the 

 existence of P.novce-zealandiw, brought me off some specimens 

 of the animal to the ship, and gave me such information about 

 its whereabouts that collectors sent from the ship were able to 

 procure me about fifty living specimens. I was unable to 

 refer to special publications at the time; and I thought the Peri- 

 patus was certainly already named ; but I examined some of 

 the specimens at once, and made notes, which I should have 

 published long ago had not press of work prevented me. 



P. novce-zealandioi is not hermaphrodite, but has well- 

 developed males, which, however, as is the case with the Cape 

 species, are less numerous than the females. Captain Hutton 

 has been unlucky, as was Grube; and his twenty specimens have 

 all been females. The males have their generative organs in 



