4874 Notices of New Books. 



gar to quench their thirst as having been supplied by polyp, the properties of which, 

 they say, were not new to them. " At a guard-house near Nan-tchang-fou, we asked 

 for some vinegar. ' I have some,' said the mandarin ; ' it is polypus vinegar, made by 

 the animal itself.' This Tsou-no-dze (vinegar polypus) is a creature that, on account 

 of its extraordinary property of making excellent vinegar, merits particular mention. 

 It is a monstrous assemblage of fleshy and glutinous membranes, tubes, and shapeless 

 appendages, that give it a very ugly and repulsive appearance ; you would take it for 

 an inert, dead mass, but when touched it contracts and dilates, and assumes various 

 forms, tit is an animal whose structure and character are not better known that that 

 of the other polypi. This Tsou-no-dze is found in the Yellow Sea, and the Chinese 

 fish for it on the coasts of Leao-tong, but it is rather scarce. Possibly it may be more 

 abundant in some other places, where it is neglected from ignorance of its peculiar 

 property. This polyp is placed in a large vessel filled with fresh water, to which a few 

 glasses of spirits are added, and after twenty or thirty days this liquid is found trans- 

 formed into excellent vinegar, without going through any other process, and without 

 the addition of the smallest ingredient. The vinegar is as clear as spring water, very 

 strong, and of a very agreeable taste. Alter the first transformation, the source ap- 

 pears inexhaustible, for as it is drawn off by degrees for consumption it is only neces- 

 sary to add an equal quantity of pure water, without any more spirit, and the vinegar 

 remains equally good. The Tsou-no-dze, like the other polypi, is easily propagated 

 by germination ; you detach a limb, which vegetates and grows, and in a short time 

 is found to possess the same property of changing water into vinegar. These details 

 are not only based on the best information we have been able to collect, but we our- 

 selves possessed one of these polypi, and kept it for a year, using constantly the deli- 

 cious vinegar which it distilled for us. At our departure for Thibet, we presented it 

 to the Christians of our mission in the Valley of Black Waters." Can this marvel- 

 lous animal, said to be fished up in the Yellow Sea, be anything else than the repul- 

 sive-looking mass, answering to Hue's description of the Tsou-no-dze, which is found 

 in certain states of acetous fermentation, distinct from the mould that occasionally 

 gathers on the surface, and which in the North of England is called "the mother," in 

 vinegar, &c, as supposed to concentrate all the acid ? Whether it is now as produc- 

 tive of agreeable vinegar as the missionary represents his polyp, I am not prepared to 

 assert. — Charles Fox ; Trebah, Falmouth. 



NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 



1 Annals and Magazine of Natural History? No. 93, dated 

 September, 1855; price '2s. 6d. London: Taylor and Francis, 

 Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 



The following are the contents: — 



' Observations on the Genera Pachybdella, Diesing, and Peltogaster, 

 Ralhke, two animal forms parasitic upon the abdomen of Crabs.' By 

 Proi'esser Steenstrup. [Extracted from Weigmann's Archiv, 1855, p. 15.] 



* Notes on Palaeozoic Bivalved Entomostraca. No. II. Some British 

 and Foreign Species of Beyrichia.' By T. Rupert Jones, F.G.S. 



