2 Transactions of the Society. 



creatures, with a view to making our fauna more generally known. 

 It is the experience of every one entering upon an almost untrodden 

 path in natural history, or indeed in any other science, that at first 

 new species and new facts accumulate rapidly and easily, while, 

 after a time, novelties, whether of observation or of species, are more 

 difficult to find and more laborious to follow out. I am not an ex- 

 ception to this rule, and naturally I cannot record the number of 

 additions which I was able to make in my former papers. My 

 searches have, however, been rewarded by finding species which I 

 believe to be not only new to Britain, but entirely unrecorded any- 

 where, and which are far too numerous to be figured in the neces- 

 sarily and properly limited number of plates which the kindness of 

 this Society can place at my disposal. I do not think that written 

 descriptions of creatures of this nature are of much real service 

 without drawings, as, after all, words are but a vague way of 

 identifying form upon which so much depends. I also think that 

 drawings, to be of use to other naturalists, must be upon a sufficient 

 scale to show detail, particularly with such organisms as the 

 Orihatidx, where specific distinctions depend greatly upon the for- 

 mation of the essential parts of the cephalothorax, which in itself 

 is frequently very small in proportion to the abdominal region. I 

 have therefore thought it best, in this paper, to describe and figure 

 a few of the more interesting unrecorded species with, I hope, some 

 degree of exactitude, rather than to figure a larger number upon a 

 scale which might possibly not be sufficient for identification 

 hereafter. 



Before proceeding to notice the unrecorded species, I will deal 

 with such further observations as I can place before you relative to 

 the habits, &c., of this family oi Acarina. 



Deposition or Protection of the Ova. 



It will be found, by those who read works referring to this sub- 

 ject, that a great number of naturalists broadly state that the 

 Orihatidm are viviparous, I am not quite sure where the idea 

 originated ; some suppose that Claparede is responsible for it, but I 

 fail to find anything in the writings of that excellent observer 

 which in any way justifies the accusation. His only work treating 

 of any of the Ortbatidse, as far as I am aware, is his chapter on the 

 development of Hojjhphora contractilis (as he calls it), in his 

 ' Studien an Acariden,' and in this he expressly says that the idea is 

 erroneous. It is not of much importance where the suggestion 

 came from, but it is more worthy of remark that it has found its 

 way into the works of some of the ablest and most accurate writers, 

 who of course did not take it, or profess to take it, from their own 

 observations, but simply on the authority of others ; thus, for 



