26 MEMOIES OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



growing from the bind body of a cave cricket (Hadencecus subterraneus). A young Peziza (identi- 

 fied by Professor Farlow) occurred in Weyer's Cave; it was not in fruit, was colorless, and im- 

 possible to determine specifically. A colorless agaric also occurred in Weyer's Cave. 



Mr. Hovey notices the occurrence of agarics in Eiver Hall, Mammoth Cave : " In 1881 we found 

 a natural bed of mushrooms growing here, a species of Agaricus." 



Mr. Hovey discovered two species of fungi in Luray Cave; oue was a long white mold hanging 

 in festoons, tbe other supposed to be a new species which he described under the name of Mucor 

 stalactitis in the Scientific American for March, 1879. 



Washington's Hall is a chamber of the largest size, and for many years the lunching place 

 of tourists. ' ; The floor of the hall is of white gypsum sand strewed with fragments of the same 

 material. The larger masses of gypsum afford convenient seats and tables for picnickers, and are 

 strewn about with chicken bones and bits of food. The accumulation of such rejectamenta is very 

 great, to be reckoned perhaps by the cart-load ; yet, notwithstanding the presence of so much offal, 

 kept perpetually moist by contact with the gypsum sand, not the slightest taint is perceptible in 

 the air of the chamber; only at close quarters the recently-deposited morsels give off a peculiarly 

 rancid odor. As before, in the Eotunda, I was struck with the conviction that decay in the cave 

 is an exceedingly slow process, accomplished mainly through the agency of a few fungi. * Professor 

 Tyndall has shown that in the pure atmosphere of the Alps perishable infusions of meat and 

 vegetables remain unchanged for an indefinite length of time, t May it not be that the equally 

 pure and bracing air of these caverns is likewise comparatively free f om the germs of Bacteria, 

 Vibrios, and other agents of putrefaction and fermentation ? It has been asserted by the guides 

 that meat hung up "at the mouth of the cave" will keep fresh a long time, f But if Bacteria are 

 absent, other scavengers in abundance attack this food material. I found it swarming with the 

 larvse of Adelops and the maggots of a small fly (Phora). The imagos of the beetle and puparia 

 of the fly were also present in countless numbers." (Hubbard, Amer. Ent., iii., 38.) 



III.— SYSTEMATIC DESCRIPTION OE THE INVERTEBRATE ANIMALS. 



INFUSOBIA. 



Four species of Infusoria appear to have been discovered by Dr. Tellkampf iu Mammoth 

 Cave, and I quote the following remarks on these forms from his essay in the New York Journal 

 of Medicine for July, 1845, page 86 : "I have examined the water of the cavern for animalcnlae, 

 and have shown some hasty sketches of them to Professor Ehrenberg, of Berlin, Germany, who 

 has furnished me with some remarks concerning them. 



" In the farthest grotto, ' Serena's Bower,' 9 miles from the entrance of the cave, are found 

 some animalcuke resembling Monas kolpoda, Monas socialis, and a new species similar in external 

 form to the Bodo. 



"The water of the ' Styx' contains a Chilomonas, which also appears to be new. Ch. emargi- 

 nata, elliptic, irregularly sinuated, with a projecting lip; and, besides, another species resembling 

 the Kolpoda eucullus; possibly it might have been the Chilodon cucullus, which is very common in 

 mines." 5 



* The fungi of our caves have not, as far as I know, been studied. Two species have been identified by Dr. 

 Farlow from the Mammoth Cave, Ozonium auricomum Link, the mycelium of an unknown fungus, and StemonUis 

 ferruginea, also immature. A list by Pokorny of fungi from tho Adelsberg and Luege caverns ( Germany), extracted 

 from Dr. Ad. Schmidt's Die Grotten und Hoehlen von Adolsberg, Wien, 1854, and kindly sent me by Dr. Hagen, 

 enumerates nineteen species, all found above ground, and originating, as Pokorny thinks, from spores introduced 

 from without on wood. (Hubbard, I. c.) 



t For an accurate account of these experiments, see Popular Science Monthly for February, 1878. (Hubbard, I. c. ) 

 X During the summer months, when the temperature outside is higher than that of the cave (59° Fahr. ), a strong 

 current of air flows out of its mouth. The incoming supply is said to be by filtration through the rocks, in which 

 case it would be very probably freed of floating germs. (Hubbard, I. c. ) 



I In addition, Ehrenberg (Microgeologie, 1856) gives a list of eight Polygastric Infusoria (Biddulphia ? , fossil f , 

 Bodo ? , Chilomonas, Gallionella ? , Kolpoda, Monas ? , Synedra viva) ; oue fossil Polythalamian (infusorian ;) five Phyto- 

 litharia ; and plant forms (microscopic fungi)." (Hubbard, in Amer. Ent., iii, 79.) 



