40 THE ROT1FE1IA. 



crop, attached to the walls of the stomach ; ami to reacL the Latter everything must i 

 between them. The Floscules are great feeders, and sometimes the crop becomes so 

 distended with food, that the animal, unable to force it past the jaws quickly enough, 

 seeks relief by expelling the contents of the crop right through the inverted tube. Tin 

 lobes of the corona are folded back on the body, the diaphragm is pushed upwards and 

 the tube is thrust inside out through the slit in the diaphragm; while through it poms 

 the unmanageable food. Dr. Moxon (loc. cit.) has seen this take place on two separate 

 occasions, and I have seen it once: in each case the animal was F. campanulata. 1 

 The appearances due to the tube have been variously described as caused by moving 

 filaments, laminae, vibratile cilia, and a waving membrane ; but these observations of 

 Dr. Moxon, confirmed by my own, put the matter beyond doubt. 



The Trunk. — The outer wall of the trunk is a tough, elastic, and often shining 

 cuticle, which has an inner and softer layer of varying thickness. This double covering 

 interferes greatly with a clear view of the viscera , especially as it has intercommunicating 

 cavities and channels containing fluid, which is driven upwards and downwards by the 

 contraction of the muscles, and by the various motions of the body. Nor is this all ; for 

 the fluid itself is often rendered semiopaque by granules floating in it. It is doubtless by 

 means of this fluid that the lobes of the furled corona are pushed forward and expanded, 

 the transverse muscles of the trunk forcing it into .definite channels, which are thus 

 rendered tight and stiff, like the ribs of an umbrella. Mr. Gosse 2 has described and 

 figured these in the case of F. ornata ; and has noticed how the granules flow from the 

 trunk over the neck into the various channels of the coronal cup. Mr. Hood, too, has 

 watched a steady stream of granules passing down from the trunk into the foot, and 

 returning again from a point about half way from its extremity. The granules may be 

 frequently seen, in some degree, in specimens of almost every species, but occasionally 

 they are in such abundance as to render the animal quite opaque ; and, by reflected 

 light, of a dead white. 



The foot is very long and flexible, and is capable of great expansion and contraction, 

 but cannot be drawn into the trunk. It consists of little else but muscles. The great 

 longitudinal muscles pass down its whole length, and numerous fine muscular fibres 

 encircle it everywhere, covering it with transverse rings of very variable thickness, from 

 its junction with the trunk to its extremity. This latter contracts to an inextensible, 

 and usually short cord or peduncle, which itself terminates in a sort of disk. In the foot 

 are also the two club-shaped glands (so common in other genera) which probably secrete 

 a viscous fluid for fastening the disk to some extraneous object. 



The Nutritive System. — The food is feebly pecked at by the jaws, while it is in the crop, 

 but it evidently undergoes there some process of digestion. I once saw a Floscule bolt a 

 small Salpina. When inside the crop it was still alive, and it charged from side to 

 side, in the vain hope of escape. The sharp points of its lorica ought to have made its 

 captor uncomfortable ; but the only result was, that its outline gradually grew dim, and 

 that before long the whole animal faded into a shapeless mass. 



Mr. Gosse 3 notices the absence of the mastax, and says of the trophi that " the jaws 

 consist of a pair of curved unjomted but free mallei, with a membranous process beneath 

 each. Each malleus (PI. I. figs. 9ft, 96) is an uncus of two slender arched divergent 

 fingers, united by a subtle web ; the back of each curves downwards, where, expanding 

 and becoming membranous, it is connected with some delicate but definite processes with 

 rounded outlines, which I should have supposed to be muscular bulbs, but that they 

 remain after treatment with potash." 



After passing between the jaws the food enters the stomach (PL II. fig. 4, s) appar- 

 ently directly, as no oesophagus is visible. The alimentary canal is divided into stomach I s ) 

 intestine (i), and rectum (r), which latter is bent on itself, and ascends to the cloaca (cl) 



' Fig. 1, PI. I 1 , is a copy of Dr. Moxon's drawing, showing the tube tinned inside out and pro- 



.1 through the slit in the diaphragm : the lobes (/) are shown drawn down close to the body. 

 ■ Poj ulai Si i. Rev. vol. i. 1SG2, p. 100, pi. ix. * Phil. Trans. 18S6, p. 410. 



