ASCARIS MYSTAX. 317 



of Dr. Lankester and Mr. ScattergQod, I have since been enabled 

 to carry out my wish, and by the aid of their valuable contribution 

 of specimens I have succeeded in establishing the truth of several 

 facts, which Kiichenmeister and others regarded as mere myths, and 

 I have also vindicated the authority and general accuracy of Dr. 

 O'Bryen Bellingham, and other Irish naturalists, whose statements 

 had been, in my opinion, rather unfairly handled by one or two of the 

 leading helminthologists of the day. If my memory does not fail 

 me, the fourth case (to which Leuckart has called my attention) 

 occurred in an adult, in whose digestive tube no less than twelve 

 examples of this worm had taken up their residence. With these 

 few preliminary observations I proceed to give the necessary details 

 as follows : — 



21. ASOAEIS MYSTAX. 



A. m^ystax, Rudolphi ; Bremser ; Dujardin ; etc. 



A.felis, Grmelin; J. Y.Thomson; Pickells; etc. 



A. teres felis, Goeze. 



A. cati, Schrank. 



A. alata, BeUingham ; Dujardin ; Diesing. 



Fusaria mystax, Zeder. 



Gefieral and Specific Characters. — A moderate-sized nematode helminth, characterized 

 more especially by the presence of conspicuous, alaform appendages, one on either side 

 of the head; which, however, vary somewhat in their degree of development in different 

 examples of the worm ; the male acquires a length of two inches and a half, whilst that 

 of the female is sometimes a little beyond four inches ; the former also seldom exceeds 

 half a line in breadth, whilst the corresponding measurement of the latter is just double ; 

 the tail of the male is strongly arcuate, whilst the body itself invariably displays a dispo- 

 sition to coil upon itself, the female exhibiting the same tendency in a less marked 

 degree ; the spicules, two in number, acquire a length of about ^ of an inch ; the eggs 

 presenting a longitudinal diameter of s\n". 



The late Dr. Bellingham, who was one of the surgeons of St. 

 Vincent's Hospital, Dublin, published in the thirteenth volume of 

 the " Annals of Natural History" an extended catalogue of Irish 

 entozoa ; and in this list he recorded the existence of a new round 



