Vol. Il, No. 4.] Notes on the Freshwater Fauna of India. 113 
[N.S.] 
however, much smaller than this species. In both sexes there 
are a-number of dark cross-bars on the abdome 
The young larva is very active. It is frequently found wan- 
dering among’ colonies of, such Protozoa as Vorticella nebulifera and 
such Rotifers as the gregarious Melicertide, 
As the larva approaches maturity, it commences to build for 
itself temporary shelters. These are of two kinds: —(1) a silken 
tunnel with its base formed of some smooth natural surface ; or (2) 
a regular tube, often oe ws a a stalk on its base either to 
a smooth level surface or to some rounded o object, and covered on. 
the sides and back donee se or ioied distinet projections. I cannot 
detect any difference betw the larva which makes the tunnel 
and that which makes the ihe, and my captive specimens have never 
' made the latter while under observation. I am inclined to think 
that the character of the shelter is partly a question of food-supply 
and partly due to the imminence or non-imminence of an ecdysis. 
t is easy to watch the making of a tunnel by a larva in cap- 
tivity, fr it usually chooses the side of the aquarium as the base of 
its shelter. Having settled on a suitable spot, after stumping 
along ss glass in all directions for some minutes, it becomes sta- 
s 
ing its mouth against the glass and a its head through the 
sso / weaves the anterior part of yee shelter. The threads are 
not drawn parallel to one ——— but so arranged as to forma 
e it again in so doing, and proceeds to spin the posterior half. 
Thee j it oa round again, and suddenly darting out from the en- 
_ The ppaneseiees of the shelter differs greatly on different occasi 
had frequently” natined that maces brought from’ the tank 
nypus is not recorded from British India; a bat several Juvanese » Species are 
nan The larva of one lorum, has. 
in the Calcutta water-works (Ind, Mus. Notes . Vy, 
; to give toe seca the habits of this form and of other incola of 
the sponge shortly —-N. A , 17-4-06.} ‘T found a third yi abundant at the end ° 
of Fannary in brackish: pools at-Port Ganning; Lower Bengal: It lived both in 
the tissues of a second sponge (8. lacustris var. bengalensis) and among the : 
matied colonies ‘ota Polyz00n. In. the same pools. the eggs of two species: 
common. at t _ In’one the egg-mass was shaped like a 
pie uttachert “et one-end yin the “other: it formed long strings of rather 
irregniar form: 
