280 



SCIENCE-GOSSir. 



[Dec. ], 1865. 



Fly fou Pike-fishii^g/''! 



The same writer says that he has not mifrequently 

 killed Pike Avith a fly on bright cleav days, when 

 spinning vv'as utterly useless. As a ride, Pike- 

 flies cannot well be too gaudy, though they may 

 easily be too big. The bodies should be fat and 

 rough, made of coloured pigs' wool, cocks' hackles, 

 &c., and plentifully bedizened with beads and tinsels ; 

 the Avings of two peacocks' moon-feathers (tail- 

 feathers with eyes in them). 



" In the western lakes of Ireland, patterns dressed 

 with sable or other furs and without wings, are more 

 in favour. Ephemera tliinks the Pike-fly is looked 

 upon by the Pike as a gigantic Dragon-fly ; but that 

 it is mistaken for a Yellow-hannner, or, perhaps, for 

 a Swallow, appears to me to be the more probable 

 liypothesis. Indeed, a Yellow-hammer or other 

 small bright bird dragged along the surface of the 

 water, is quite as good a bait as the regular Pike-fly, 

 if not better. According to an excellent trolling 

 authority, much may be done in Ireland by trailing 

 the tuft of the end of a calf's tail well armed with 

 hooks. The engraving is taken from a very fine 

 specimen of the Pike-flj', as used in Ireland, and was 

 presented to me by Mr. Martin Kelly, of Dublin. 

 Any combination, however, of feathers and tinsel, 

 which is bright and big, would probably answer the 

 purpose equally well ; indeed, even the size seems 

 to be doubtful, as I have twice caught Pike with 

 Clnib-flies ; and Stoddart says, that in Loch Led- 

 gowan. Pike are fished for with flies ' dark in colour, 

 and resembling those used in many rivers for 

 summer Grilse.' ; 



Mr. Pennell's treatise is Avell worthy of the 

 attention of Pike-flshers, as it contains, besides a 

 very large personal experience, the results of the 

 opinion of all the leading authorities on the subject. 



SIMPLE OBJECTS.— IX. 



Pandokina mouum. 



THE accompanying figures represent one of the 

 Volvocineee, apparently that form of Pandorina 

 morum referred to in the Micrographic Dictionary,* 

 " with sixteen or thirty-two gonidia closely crowded 

 together, instead of standing at wide intervals in the 

 large colourless envelope : it is uncertain M'hether 

 this form is multiplied vegetatively ; but we have 

 seen its gonidia all converted into resting spores." 



What I have noticed with respect to this plant 

 seems to prove that it is " multiplied vegetatively." 



In its usual condition the number of gonidia is 

 sixteen (figs. 4, 6, 9), though there are frequently 

 only tvvelve (figs. 1, 2, 3). These are enclosed in a 

 thick gelatinous envelope, through the walls of whicli 

 pass two cilia from each gonidium, by means of which 

 these plants move rapidly with a rotatory motion. 

 The gonidia seem to have the power of altering their 

 shape spontaneously, being sometimes pear-shaped 

 (fig. 1), at others inversely pear-shaped (fig. 2). 

 Each has a vacuole at the end, from which the cilia 

 spring ; and, very frequently, if not always, a red 

 spot near. Sometimes the envelope has a striated 

 appearance, (fig. 3), as if the substance had become 



* Page 5'i6, second edition, 



