I 



Miscellaneous. 67 



cases this passage corresponded to the underground gallery of the 

 worm. 



At the close of the rainy period of September all the passages 

 were perfectly free ; but after a few dry days they were found to bo 

 obstructed by recent castings, no doubt owing to the worm being 

 prevented, by the hardening of the summit of the tower, from push- 

 ing through it to deposit the castings outside. A period of rain is 

 therefore necessary for the production of regular towers, which pro- 

 bably serve principally to protect the subterranean galleries from 

 the influx of rain-water, but may also enable the worms to come up 

 and respire, sheltered from wet and at the same time concealed from 

 birds. 



As to the species of worm which formed the towers observed by 

 him, M. Trouessart states that at first he supposed that it might 

 also belong to the genus Pericfaxta, several eastern-Asiatic species of 

 which have been naturalized in the south of France and in Algeria. 

 Great numbers of worms were collected near the spots where the 

 turriform eastings were abundant; they all proved to be species of 



with 



worm 



L. communis, Hoffm. On two or three c 

 caught in his tower by suddenly pinching the latter when soft. The 

 worms thus captured always belonged to Lumbricus agricola ; and it 

 was the anterior part of the body that was lodged in the tower. 

 Comptes Rendu*. October 23, 1882. n. 739. 



On a Fish from the Abysses of the Atlantic (Eurypharynx 



pelecanoides). By 31. L. Vaillant. 



i 



In the last expedition of the * Travailleur ' we found off the coast 

 of Morocco, at a depth of 2300 metres, a fish which may be regarded 

 as one of the most singular creatures with which deep-sea dredgings 

 have made us acquainted. 



This animal, about 0*47 metre long and 0-02 metre high at the 

 most elevated part, is of an intense deep black colour. The body, 

 the form of which is masked in front by the abnormal mouth, which 

 will be mentioned further on, resembles that of Macrurus ; it be- 

 comes regularly attenuated from about the anterior fourth, the 

 point at which the external branchial orifice is seen, and termi- 

 nates in a point at the caudal extremity ; the anus is situated at 

 the junction of the anterior third with the posterior two thirds of 

 the body. 



"What gives this fish a very peculiar physiognomy is the arrange- 

 ment of the jaws and the structure of the mouth, which are even an 

 exaggeration of what Mr. Ayres has described in Malacosteus niger* 

 Although the head is short, scarcely 0*03 metre, the jaws and the 

 suspensorium are excessively elongated ; the latter did not measure 

 less than 0*095 metre ; and from this it results that the articular 

 angle is carried very far back, to a distance from the end of the 



