ItBACUlSfClTT.US J[EDINENSIS. 883 



during the winter of 1853-54. In July, 1854, M. Eobin made a 

 similar statement shortly after his examination of a fresh Dracun- 

 culus which had been extracted from the leg of a man by M. Mal- 

 gaigne. Robin, not unsuitably, compared the worm to a double 

 tube, one tubular sheath, as it were, enclosing the other. " The 

 second tube," he distinctly affirms, "is the oviduct, or, rather, that 

 part ivhich represents the uterus. The young still remaining in the 

 uterus were nearly all coiled, sometimes with the tail sallying out- 

 wards, at others roUed hke the rest of the body." I have thought 

 it only due to Robin and myself to show that we, at least, what- 

 ever our shortcomings, were ten years ago, from our own personal 

 observations, made perfectly aware of the " great development of 

 the genital tube, and its close adherence to the parietes of the body." 

 Respecting the full-sized young Dracunculi our observations, as 

 well as those of Carter and Busk, have exhibited several discrepan- 

 cies, some of which have been satisfactorily accounted for by the 

 excellent descriptions of Bastian. Thus, in regard to their struc- 

 ture, most of us agreed in recognizing a shghtly-trilobed or tri- 

 papillated mouth; but Carter failed to demonstrate the existence of 

 these tubercules, and spoke of the oral aperture as being simple 

 or "pxmctiform." The body throughout its three upper fourths 

 appeared to me to be cylindrical, but Robin found that it was 

 flattened ; it is finely striated transversely, except at the part where 

 it rapidly contracts to form the slender, sharply-pointed tail. 

 According to Carter, Robin, and Davaine, the young attain a length 

 of about sa of an inch, but Bastian gives it as about ^". In thick- 

 ness, Carter gives the approximative diameter as -^", Robin makes 

 it ^" to i^", whilst Bastian gives their breadth at £^", and 

 Davaine ^' . I make their greatest length and breadth to be ^" 

 Tqj _^", Robin, Moquin-Tandon, and myself thought we recog- 

 nized a distinct, rounded, anal orifice ; and whilst Busk, on the one 

 hand saw nothing which in the slightest degree indicated the pre- 

 sence of an anal opening, Carter, on the other hand, described the 

 structure which we called the anus as a gland, at the same time 



