ZOOLOaY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 591 



corpuscles of the coelom may be sometimes found in considerable numbers 

 in the infundibular ducts. 



It is clear that if the Sarasins' view of the function of this organ be 

 correct, the organ must .have an efferent duct or ureter : this is to be 

 found in the structure, as to the existence of which authors have differed 

 so much. The causes of the difficulty in detecting it are that it arises 

 from the side of the organ, and that it becomes lost in the remarkable 

 spongy structures filled with coelomic corpuscles, about which so much 

 has been recently written. 



The renal cavity, which is of some size in the lower and middle 

 parts of the organ, is much constricted superiorly. The stone-canal and 

 ureter unite into a common collecting vesicle, which, by means of a 

 narrow canal, passes into the collecting cavity of the canuliculi of the 

 madreporite. The renal cavity ends blindly near the circumoesophageal 

 vascular ring, and the blood-carrying meshes of the connective tissue of 

 the kidney communicate with the lacunae of the blood-vascular ring. 

 The excretory matters of the blood are alone removed from the body by 

 the ureter. The authors regard the whole kidney as an appendage of 

 the water-vascular system, the excretory nature of which has lately been 

 insisted on by Hartog. 



Remarkable Ophiurid from Brazil.* — Prof. F. Jeffrey Bell gives an 

 account of an Ophiurid from Itamaraca, the arms of which are about 

 forty times the diameter of the disc. Owing to the fact that all three 

 specimens have lost the covering of their disc, it is impossible to say 

 definitely to what genera these interesting forms belong, but on the 

 supposition that the amount is small, or that the disc is nearly " naked," 

 the species, which is called sesquij^edaUs, is placed in Liitken's genus 

 OphionepJithys. It is possible that the loss of the upper surface of the 

 disc is associated with the evacuation of the genital products. Naturalists 

 who may have the advantage of seeing this very long-armed form alive, 

 should carefully observe the phenomena of the restoration of the disc. 



New and Old Holotliurians.t — Prof. H. Ludwig has had the oppor- 

 tunity of examining the sixteen Holothurians collected in Ceylon by the 

 Drs. Sarasin, and he takes the opportunity of suggesting that some 

 recently described species are synonymous with forms already known. 

 Three species from Angra Pequena are also noticed. Eighteen species 

 collected by Dr. Sander, of the German ship ' Prinz Adalbert,' are also 

 enumerated ; among them there is a new species of Pseuclocucumis 

 (P. Theeli) ; the study of this has resulted in a fresh diagnosis of some 

 allied genera; with Pseudocucumis Prof. Ludwig would place AmpM- 

 cyclus, as he does not attach as much importance to the presence of an 

 inner circlet of smaller tentacles as do Bell and Lamport ; he refuses 

 consequently to accept Lamport's division of the Polychirotse of Bell 

 into the sub-groups of Monocyclia and Amphicyclia. 



Coelenterata. 



New Mode of Life among Medusae. | — Mr. J. W. Fewkes gives an 

 account of an extraordinary case of parasitism among Medusae. Near 

 the anal fin of Seriola zonata curious appendages, which reminded him 



* Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., i. (1888) pp. 368-70. 



t SB. K. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. Berlin, 1887, pp. 1217-44 (1 pi.). 



X Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., i. (1888) pp. 362-8. 



