50 BULLETIN: MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 
here introduced, has resulted in my determining that a distinct oral aper- 
ture is developed upon one side of the body at a short distance only 
from the apical extremity. This orifice takes the form of a transverse 
slit, and is followed by a narrow csophageal tract which opens into the 
capacious digestive cavity that occupies one half or two thirds of the 
posterior region of the body. The plan recommended by Dr. Leidy for 
observing the vital phenomena of these animalcules is to empty out the 
intestine of the White Ant containing them into a little white of egg. I 
also have found this material favorable for their observation, but have 
gained an additional insight into their life history by employing in a 
like manner thinly diluted milk. In this medium they not only live for 
a considerable time, but meet with abundant nutriment, their pharynx 
and digestive cavity being frequently found densely packed with its 
component corpuscles after their immersion in this fluid for a short 
interval.” 
Unfortunately, Kent does not give any figures, and I have been un- 
able to discover in the living animals the mouth he describes. However, 
the existence of such astructure could, I imagined, be easily determined 
by means of sections. These I endeavored to procure by sectioning the 
whole alimentary canal of the Termes, hoping in this way to obtain some 
sections of Trichonympha in a direction favorable for settling this point. 
I was not disappointed, 
To my astonishment I found that the small intestine was completely 
packed with animalcules, and among them hundreds of Trichonympha ; 
these, however, were not promiscuously distributed through the parasitic 
mass, but were, as a rule, excluded from the periphery of the intestine. 
This position, of course, precluded the possibility of their attaching 
themselves directly to the wall of the host's intestine. 
The sections of Trichonympha thus obtained revealed absolutely no 
trace of such an oral aperture as that described by Kent. They did 
show, however, an interesting condition of affairs, which I think may 
perhaps account for the presence of the numerous fragments of ligneous 
fibre and other food particles so often found within the body, without 
necessarily supposing them to have entered through a persistent mouth, 
In many of the cross sections of the posterior half of Trichonympha I 
observed deep folds of the body wall; these almost invariably contained 
cilia, doubtless engulfed at the time of the folding (Plate 2, Figs. 9, 10, 
and 14). Particles of wood fibre were also seen entangled among the 
cilia in these folds (Fig. 10, for. lig.). I think we have in this condition 
an explanation of the mystery. Cilia entangling particles of woody fibre 
