February 16, 1900.] 



SCIENCE, 



247 



proposition that a branch or section of the 

 American Naturalists should be authorized 

 to hold meetings in the Central States, but 

 had appointed a committee to consider the 

 matter, it was decided not to organize. A 

 committee consisting of Professors Eieg- 

 hard, Locy and ISTachtrieb was instructed to 

 nominate five naturalists who should have 

 charge of all arrangements for a second 

 meeting and should report at that meeting 

 recommendations for a permanent organi- 

 zation and for the establishment of relations 

 with the American Society of Naturalists. 

 The committee subsequently elected con- 

 sists of Professors Birge, President ; Barnes, 

 Lee, Nutting and Davenport, Secretary. 



Abstracts of the papers read at the meet- 

 ing follow : 



Townet collecting at Cold Spring Harbor, Long 



Island. Chas. P. Sigebfoos. 



During the sumrtiers of 1898-99 fairly 

 complete records of townet collecting were 

 kept at the Laboratory of the Brooklyn In- 

 stitute. Cold Spring Harbor is so far from 

 the open sea that larval and other transi- 

 tory pelagic forms are never, perhaps, swept 

 in by winds and tides from the outside. 

 This is an advantage in many cases, be- 

 cause it enables the collector to say that 

 certain forms found there live, thrive and 

 breed locally. 



As elsewhere, the day collections are less 

 varied and abundant than those made in 

 the night-time. In the former are present 

 the medusae of various hydroids (Podo- 

 coryne, Bougainvillea, Perigonimus, Obelia, 

 etc.) ; ctenophores(il/?iemiops(s)in all stages ; 

 starfish larvae ; pelagic fish eggs ; and many 

 other forms found less frequently or espe- 

 cially at night. In the night-time there 

 are present, in addition to the above, great 

 numbers of copepods (mostly of a species 

 of Acartia) , many oi its individuals parasi- 

 tized by j4po6Ze?na ; larvae, in various stages, 

 of Squilla, decapods and other crustaceans ; 



adult Diastylus, Ilysis, Gammarus, etc. ; the 

 larvae of various molluscs ( Ostrea, Crepidida, 

 Bulla); and many other forms found less 

 frequently. One of the most interesting 

 finds consisted of a few specimens of tor- 

 naria larvae, apparently belonging to an 

 undescribed species of Balanoglossus found 

 at Cold Spring Harbor. 



On the motor reactions of Flagellata and 



Ciliata. H. S. Jennings. 



Previous work had shown that the aggre- 

 gations of Paramecia in certain chemicals, 

 in regions of optimum temperature and the 

 like, as well as their avoidance of certain 

 agents, are due to a motor reflex of essen- 

 tially the same character as the motor re- 

 flexes so well known in higher organisms. 

 This reflex consists in swimming, when 

 stimulated, toward a structurally defined 

 end and turning toward a structurally de- 

 fined side, whatever the nature or position of 

 the stimulating agent. The paper presented 

 a study of a number of flagellates and cili- 

 ates, to determine whether such a motor 

 reflex is common. It showed that Chilo- 

 monas, Euglena, Loxophyllum, Colpidium, Mi- 

 crothorax, Dileptus, Loxodes, Prorodon, Stentor, 

 Spirostomum, Bursaria, Oxytricha and some 

 others respond to many stimuli by a reflex 

 essentially similar to that of Paramecium. 

 It seems probable therefore that the so- 

 called chemotaxis, thermotaxis, tonotaxis, 

 and the like of these groups of organisms 

 are in general, as in Paramecium, produced 

 through such a reflex. Whether this reflex 

 plays a part in pbototaxis, electrotaxis and 

 geotaxis has not been shown. The paper 

 showed also that many of these organisms 

 are much more sensitive at their anterior 

 ends than elsewhere on the body, and 

 brought out a number of facts in regard to 

 the reactions to localized stimuli. 



Notes on the occurrence of Uroglena in the 

 Lafayette water supply. Seveeancb Bur- 

 rage, Purdue University. 



