14 SPOBOZOA. 



parasites in the stomach of the mosquitoes fed on the blood 

 of malarial patients, and later (1898) elucidated the life-cycle 

 of the malarial parasites of birds and their transmission by 

 Culex mosquitoes. In the course of his investigations between 

 1895 and 1899 he also noted a number of other parasites of 

 mosquitoes. Ross had not received any special protozoological 

 or entomological training, and had to coin a new terminology 

 for the various phases of the parasites that he observed. 

 Since that time India has been the field of the labours of many 

 workers on different groups of Sporozoa, and it will be con- 

 venient briefly to review their work by deahng with the various 

 orders one by one. 



Gregabinida. — Ross (1895) was the first to describe 

 a Gregarine parasite from a mosquito, which he referred to as 

 Gregarina culicis. Guenther (1914) described a parasite from 

 another mosquito in Ceylon, and Mackie (1915) and Swaminath 

 (1923) recorded certain organisms from sandflies in Assam 

 and Bengal, which were later fuUy described by Short and 

 Swaminath (1927). All these organisms are now knoAvn to 

 belong to the genus Lankesteria. Cornwall (1915), while study- 

 ing the anatomy and hfe-history of Lepisma saccharina (?), 

 described some of its Gregarine parasites, which have been 

 considered as new species of Gregarina in the present work. 

 Ghosh (1923) described some monocystids from the earth- 

 worms of Calcutta. 



About the same time I took up the study of the monocystids 

 of earthworms in the Punjab, and Bhatia (1924), Bhatia and 

 Chatter] ee (1925), and Bhatia and Setna (1926) described 

 quite a number of new species, belonging to the genera Mono- 

 cystis, Apolocystis, Nematocystis, Stomatophora, Bhynchocystis, 

 and Dirhynchocystis, from the earthworms from the Punjab 

 and Bombay. Setna (1927) described a remarkable new 

 organism under the name Grayallia quadrispiiia from Pheretima 

 heterochseta from Bombay. Bhatia and Setna (1924) described 

 several cephahne Gregarines from certain Insects, including 

 Caulocephalus crenata from a beetle and Leidyana xylocopse 

 from the carpenter-bee, the latter being the first Gregarine to 

 be recorded from a h3mienopteran host. Later Setna (1931) 

 described three new Gregarines, Bhatiella morphysse, Ferraria 

 cornucephali, and Extremocystis dendrostomi from certain 

 Polychsetes, etc., taken at Port Blair in the Andaman Islands. 

 Setna and Bhatia (1934) also described some new Gregarines 

 from a prawn from Bombay. 



Gates (1926, 1933) gave a description of two very curious 

 parasites from the coelom of certain Burmese earthworms, 

 Aikinetocystis singularis and Nellocystis birmanica, which have 

 had to be placed in a family by themselves. 



Working at Calcutta, Ray initiated a series of studies on 



