278 



NATURE 



\Aug. 8, 1872 



living personage who had helped his party instead of 

 looking after the monuments of those great men who 

 have made England what she is, " My Lords, under the 

 exceptional circumstances of the case," would have " been 

 pleased to sanction thcactionof the First Commissioner.' 

 Moreover, it must be remembered that Mr. Layard was 

 only First Commissioner, and that Mr. Gladstone as a 

 Commissioner is responsible for Mr. Layard's action. 



After all, however, perhaps it is well that, considering 

 what we know of Mr. Ayrton's treatment of the living, 

 he should have as little to do with our great dead as 

 possible. Let their records vanish, let their sepulchral 

 monuments disappear. What is this to the English 

 Government 'i Uut there is a moral in all this which con- 

 ctrns the present. This treatment of a scientific society 

 is the lie plus ultra of official Philistinism. It shows that 

 any assistance rendered to the Government by scientific 

 men or scientific bodies is rendered, as matters stand at 

 present, at their peril ; and until some alteration is made, 

 any expenditure of time and energy for Government pur- 

 poses should be respectfully declined. 



NEW RESEARCHES IN ENTOZOA 

 Dcitiiigc zur Anatomie ilcr Plathi'iii iiicr. (Leipsic : 

 Engelmann. 1S72.) 



IN the first part of this serial work, just issued, the 

 authors — Dr. F. Sommer and Dr. L. Landois, Pro- 

 fessors in the University of Greifswald — confine their 

 attention to the structure of the sexually mature joints or 

 segments oi Bothriocephalus latus. With excellent judg- 

 ment they record the results of their own investigations in 

 the first twenty-six pages, the remainder of the brochure 

 being devoted to a critical comparison of the writings of 

 other helminthologists from the time of Eschricht down 

 to the latest period. This method, as they remark (s. 27), 

 not only preserves the continuity of the record of a great 

 number of frequently repeated observations and state- 

 ments, but it also has the advantage of enabling their 

 readers to discriminate between the results obtained by 

 themselves and those acquired by earlier and equally in- 

 dependent observers. 



So considerable a portion of our knowledge of the struc- 

 ture and economy of the tapeworms is due to the re- 

 searches of their own countrymen, that no surprise need 

 be expressed at the completeness of the analysis which 

 they afford of the writings of Siebold, Leuckart, Bottcher, 

 Stieda, and Knoch, of St. Petersburg. Nevertheless, we 

 may remark that, although their analysis is for the most 

 designedly confined to the facts observed in a single 

 spec'cs, there would have been no impropriety in noticing 

 some of the anatomical facts given in Van Beneden's 

 account of Bothriocephalus punctatus : and also, more 

 particularly, certain facts of a similar order given in 

 Krabbe's description of the general structure of several 

 species of parasites belonging to the same genus. Dr. 

 Olssen, of Lund, and other helminthologists, have likewise 

 recorded detached observations on the structure of the 

 Bothriocephali and their allies, some reference to which 

 might very well have been introduced in Drs. Sommer 

 and Landois' adniir.able summary. 



On account of the complex character of the organisation 



of the proglottides of Bothriocephalus, we have hitherto 

 been in doubt respecting many particulars connected with 

 the intimate structure of the adult parasite. Now, happily, 

 these aie well-nigh all removed, owing principally to the 

 investigations of Leuckart, supplemented by the present 

 "contributions." If, in matters of biologicalinvestigation, 

 any proof were wanting of the necessity of extending the 

 principle of division of toil, it would be sufficient to point 

 to Drs. Sommer and Landois' labours as affording ample 

 proof of the value of patient research within a given limited 

 area. 



The authors commence with a description of the ex- 

 terior of the proglottis, conveniently recognising at the 

 ventral surface a clear central space which corresponds 

 with the region occupied by the mass of the reproductive 

 organs, and on either side of this a marginal space whose 

 comparatively dark colour is due to the presence of 

 numerous large corpuscles lying immediately beneath the 

 integument. These are the yelk chambers. 



Tlicir account of the mode of termination of the ducts 

 of the reproductive organs at the ventral surface is in har- 

 mony with the descriptions of Eschricht and Leuckart ; 

 but it is in reference to the precise nature of the connec- 

 tion subsisting between the %'as deferens and the various 

 ducts proceeding from the female reproductive organs 

 that these contributions lend such important aid. 



The male generative apparatus consists, in the first 

 place, of a number of testicular chambers, or minute testes, 

 individually measuring about yTfj" in diameter. Each of 

 these is furnished with an excretory duct ; all the outg' o"ng 

 passages uniting to form a central cistern-like reservoir ; 

 the latter emptying itself into a single tortuous vas de- 

 ferens, or common seminal duct. Near the final outlet it 

 expands into the well-known globular or bottle-shaped 

 muscular organ, as previously described by Leuckart and 

 Bottcher. Our authors ascertained that a single joint 

 was supplied with from ten to twelve hundred of these 

 little testes. Truly the provision made for ensuring the 

 propagation of these intestinal worms is astonishing ; for 

 if we reckon a full-grown Bothriocephalus to consist of 

 three thousand proglottides (an estimate decidedly be^ow 

 the mark), that would give us over three millions as the 

 number of testes supplied to a (so-called) single parasite. 

 Shakespeare was not far wrong in the remark that " evil 

 things do fastest propagate " — a conclusion w-hich becomes 

 all the more striking when we make ourselves acquainted 

 with the exceeding complexity of the female reproductive 

 organs of the Tcrniada and their allies. 



The sexual apparatus comprises not only the vagina 

 and uterus (which in this class of creatures form totally 

 distinct passages, with separate outlets), but also three 

 special sets of organs severally concerned in the produc- 

 tion of the germ, the yelk, and the egg-shell. Moreover, 

 each organ is itself made up of numerous parts, being, at 

 the same time, supplied with its own proper excretory 

 channels. AU this, of course, we knew before ; but in 

 tracing out the relations subsisting between these various 

 channels and the or-gans vhence they proceed, and also 

 in establishing the mode in which their final connection 

 with the vagina and uterus is brought about, Drs. Sommer 

 and Landois have displayed consummate ability, and have 

 thus materially added to our knowledge. 



T. Spencer ConiiOLu 



