PROTEOSOMA. 257 



Bruce Majme (1929), after reviewing the previous literature 

 on the subject, and after recording his observations to the 

 effect that these " black spores " have been found during 

 experiments with avian malaria in uninfected mosquitoes, as 

 well as in mosquitoes harbouring the parasites of malaria, 

 and even in freshly emerged, unfed, laboratory-bred females and 

 males of Anopheles, Gulex, and Musca, comes to the conclusion 

 that most, if not all, " black spores " appear to be merely 

 chitinogenous thickenings of the tracheal tubes. Eaiowles and 

 Basu (1933) conclude that no less than three, if not four, 

 different structures have been described as " black spores " 

 or " chitin corpuscles " by different workers. These are : 

 (a) True malaria oocysts which have undergone degeneration, 

 and in which a very heavy deposition of pigment has occurred ; 

 these alone they beheve to be the true " black spores " 

 of Ross ; (b) a hyper-chitinization of segment-like portions of 

 the finer ramifications of the tracheal system ; (c) fungus 

 infections of the tracheal system ; (d) infections of the mos- 

 quito tissues concerned with miscrosporidian parasites. 

 Their observations, based upon material studied in sections, 

 led them to conclude that (b), (c), and (d) have nothing to do 

 with true " black spores," which had lietter be described as 

 " degenerated and hyper-pigmented oocysts " or ruptured 

 contents of the same. 



Habitat. — Blood of sparrows, larks, pigeons, crows : Bengal, 

 Calcutta ; some birds : Ceylon ; oocysts in mosquitoes, Gulex 

 fatigans Wied., fed on these birds ; also in Anopheles subpictus 

 Grassi (=ro55n) : also blood of white-throated munia, Uroloncha 

 malabarica Linn., and common Indian starKng, Sturnus 

 vulgaris poltaratshyi Finsch, from India, and Tragopan satyra 

 (Linn.), from the Himalayas, in the Zoological Gardens, 

 London. 



219. Proteosoma sp. 



^Plasmodium (?) sp., Scott, 1926, p. 237 ; Wenyon, 1926, p. 136 6. 

 Plasmx)dium sp., Coatney & Roudabush, 1936, p. 341 ; de Mello, 

 1937 a, p. 95. 



Habitat. — Blood of the sarus crane, Antigone antigone (Linn,), 

 from India, in the Zoological Gardens, London. 



220. Proteosoma sp. 



^Plamnodium, sp., Donovan (first recorded in Wenyon, 1926, 

 p. 1371). 

 Plasm,odium sp., de Mello, 1937 a, p. 95. 



Habitat. — Blood of the Indian house crow, Gorvus svle.nde.ns 

 Vieillot : India (locaUty not cited). 



SPOK. s 



