518 SUMMAEY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



2. Common characters, classification, and affinity. 



The author defines Anioebans as Monerans which have acquired a 

 nucleus and contractile vacuoles, and distinguishes 17 genera, 

 a third group of flagellate Amoebans being here formed of the genera 

 Mastigamoeba, Beptomonas, and Bhizomonas. 



Kent's Manual of the Infusoria. — This is now completed by the 

 issue of the 6th part and forms a magnificent monograph of the 

 Infusoria which cannot fail to be of the greatest value and assistance 

 to the microscopist. 



The concluding part has an appendix containing a notice of 

 species recorded during the publication of the work, a glossary of 

 technical terms, an extensive bibliography of the Infusoria, and a 

 plate illustrating the apparatus employed by Messrs. Dallinger and 

 Drysdale and by Professor Tyndall in their investigations on Monads, 

 &c. The plate also contains a figure of a Microscope and lamp 

 arranged for working with high powers, the Microscope being 

 horizontal and the lamp turned with the narrow edge of the flame 

 towards the condenser. The plan described is by no means the 

 novelty which it is suggested to be ; it is, in fact, the one adopted 

 since the days of Quekett for all delicate high-power work. 



Flagellata.* — In a previous communication J. Kunstlerf recorded 

 the results of researches undertaken on the Flagellata, to which more 

 recent observations enable him to add some new facts. 



Cryptomonas ovata Ehrbg., after being submitted to the action of 

 acetic acid, appears to be covered with filaments ; Biitschli, who has 

 described analogous productions in CMlomonas paramazcium Ehrbg., 

 considers that they are trichocysts, that is, organs of defence com- 

 parable to the nematocysts of Coelenterata ; the author, however, has 

 never been able to see in this organism the small rods which are so 

 abundant in the integuments of certain ciliated Infusoria, and within 

 which, if the comparison with urticating organs is correct, the 

 attenuated prolongations should at first be enclosed. The filaments, 

 incomparably more numerous than those which have been figured by 

 Biitschli, form a thick peripheral layer, and their length is often 

 enormous, thus there are some ten times the length of the body ; 

 generally they take an upward inclination. At the upper part of the 

 body, on the prolongation of the posterior margin of the hollow in 

 the digestive chamber, two or sometimes three of these prolongations 

 may be observed which are thicker, longer, and more rigid, whilst 

 the others are often slightly flexible. Cryptomonas erosa also has 

 these filaments. 



In the cold season, Cryptomonas ovata acquires special characters. 

 The nucleus only contains the large nucleolus. The cuticle is 

 generally very thick over the whole surface of the body, and the 

 vacuoles in it are very easily visible without the intervention of any 

 reagent ; in certain points this cuticle presents a very considerable 

 development, for example at the lower extremity where it forms a 



* Oomptes Kendus, xciv. (1882) pp. 1432-3. 



t Ibid., xciii. (1881) pp. 746-8. See this Journal, ante, pp. 62-3. 



