Hydra, or Fresh-water Polypus. 349 
Having, from time to time, collected these animals from 
the Miiclies intersecting the meadows in the Cathedral Pre- 
cinct here, I am desirous that you should record the locality, 
and, at the same time, direct “the attention of naturalists to 
these interesting objects. For the purpose of ascertaining if 
they had feomicd their summer station, I visited the spot « on 
the 20th of May; and, in a six-ounce vial of the water (from 
just beneath the nee and duckweed which I collected, I 
found no less than twelve animals, eight of which were of the 
green kind, Aydra viridis Lin. (fg. 89. a, twice the natural 
size), and four pink- 
coloured (6), noticed 
by Mr. Baker, at p. 20 
of his natural history 
of these animals. The 
green species were from 
1 to 2 lines in length ; 
the pink would stretch 
themselves to nearly 4 lines, and were much the largest ani- 
mals. On the 23d of this month they began to bud (as atc) ; 
and on the 24th, young animals, in different stages of growth, 
were to be seen extending their slender arms from nearly all 
the specimens: in some instances one, and in others two, 
were seen attached to the parent stem (de). I observed, in 
several of the young animals, only five arms, which arose 
from the remaining two not being developed. 
Mr. William Anderson, FR. S., to whom Mr. Baker ac- 
knowledges himself under great obligations for his assistance 
in his second treatise on fhe micr oscope, paid great attention 
to these animals, and collected them from the ditches around 
Norwich ; and from his manuscript journal, in my possession, 
it appears that the principal locality was a ditch in Spring 
Garden, situate about a quarter of a mile south of the place 
where I collected mine. * He remarks that he has never found 
any before the beginning of May, or later than August. Of 
their food, he observes that he found the small white worm, 
inhabiting the mud of our channels, to be more acceptable. 
Mr. Baker fed his upon the small red earth-worm. 
It would, perhaps, be superfluous in me to make any fur- 
ther remarks, so much having been said by Mr. Baker, to 
whose interesting work I beg to refer your readers. 
I am, Sir, &c. 
SamuEeL Woopwarp. 
Dian’s Square, Norwich, May 25.1829. 
* The Hydra fasca may be found in the pond by the Red House, at 
Battersea, as large as Mr. Woodward’s drawings of H. viridis. —J.D.C.S. 
AA 3 
