DESCRIPTIONS OF GENERA AND SPECIES 



225 



a thick investment of glandular cells, which are aggregated into groups; their ducts 

 appear to traverse the muscular wall of the spermiducal gland ; the gland is ciliated 

 at the end nearest to the external pore; just above the aperture of the gland, on 

 each side of the body, is a process of the body-wall, which is, perhaps, comparable to 

 the penis of the genus Stylodrilus; but it is not traversed by the canal of the 

 male duct. The septal glands occupy the fifth to the ninth segment. The nephridia 

 commence in the sixteenth segment ; they open in front of the second seta. 



AUuroides pordagei, Beddakd. 

 A. pordagei, Beddaed, Q. J. M. S. vol. xxxvi. p. 244. 

 Definition. Length about an inch; two pain of strong hearts in XII, XIII; thick septa 

 IF/XII, that dividing X/XI being thinner . Hal. — Mombasa, East Africa; fresh water. 

 The only two specimens known were collected by Mr. F. Finn in a swamp about 

 four miles up country, opposite to Mombasa Island ; the worm has a delicate appearance, 

 and appears to have no pigment in the skin. 



Appeindix to Lumbriculidae. 

 Family ECLIPIDRILIDAE. 



Befim'ITIOII'. Aquatic Oligochaeta of moderate size ; setae paired, not bifld at 

 extremity, of the usual Lumbricld pattern; the dorsal blood-vessel, with 

 a series of slightly bifid contractile appendages in posterior segments; spermi- 

 ducal glands opening on to X ; oviducts opening between X/XI ; a protrusible 

 penis ; spermathecae in IX ; spermatophores are formed. 



I do not see any way out of the acceptance of Eisen's family of Eclipidrilidae 

 for the very remarkable genus Eclipidrilus; Vejdovsky (24) refers it to the 

 family Lumbriculidae, on account of the contractile appendages of the dorsal vessel 

 and the characters of the setae. Vaillant (6), too, is disposed to follow this course, 

 'at least provisionally.' 



It is, I think, undoubtedly desirable, as Vejdovsky says, that the genital organs 

 should be subjected to renewed examination; but in the meantime it seems to me 

 that we are in possession of sufficient knowledge concerning the worm to warrant 

 its inclusion in a family of its own, which should be placed between that of the 

 Lumbriculidae and the Tubificidae. 



