Morse.] 266 [December 19, 



General Meeting. December 19, 1877. 



The President, Mr. T. T. Bouve, in the chair. Twenty-six 

 persons present. 



Professor Edward S. Morse communicated some of the 

 results of his work in Japan. His main object in visiting 

 Japan was to study more fully a group of animals upon 

 which he has been at work for a long time ■ — the Brach- 

 iopoda. 



Having accepted an appointment as Professor of Zoology in the 

 Imperial University of Tokio, he established a Zoological station on 

 the coast for. the purpose of collecting material for the University 

 Museum, and for the training of Japanese assistants in the work. 



His studies of Lingula have brought out many points new to sci- 

 ence. The discovery of auditory capsules in the class of Brachio- 

 pods, is one of the most important. These organs he determined in 

 a species of Lingula, and their position and general appearance 

 recall the auditory capsules as figured by Claparede in certain tubi- 

 colous Annelids. He has also cleared up many of the obscure points 

 in regard to the circulation, and is prepared to maintain the absence 

 of anything like a pulsatory organ, the circulation being entirely due 

 to ciliary action. Mr. Morse also described some of the habits of 

 Lingula. While partially buried in the sand, the anterior border of 

 the pallial membranes contract in such a way as to leave three large 

 oval openings, one in the centre, and one on each side. The bristles, 

 which are quite long in this region of the animal, arrange themselves 

 in such a way as to continue these openings into funnels and entan- 

 gle the mucus which escapes from the animal; these funnels have 

 firm walls. A continual current is seen passing down the side fun- 

 nels and escaping by the central one. 



They bury themselves very quickly in the sand, and the peduncle 

 agglutinates a sand tube. They attach themselves by means of this 

 tube to the bottom of dishes in which they are confined. 



Mr. Morse exhibited living specimens of Lingula which he had 

 brought from Japan in a small glass jar. The water had only keen 

 changed twice since August 20th, and yet no specimen had died. 

 This illustrated the vitality of Lingula more fully even than the 

 experiments he had made on the North Carolina Lingula several 

 years since. 



