HABITS OF LINGULA, 



by Mr. Hatta, Professor of Biology in the Peer's School. Near 

 Kumamoto there is an inlet called Matsubasé which forms a part of the 

 May of Ariaké. The vast area of the inlet is covered by a sandy 

 flat (Kitadasu) in which Lingula, Tapes, Cytherea, etc. are found 

 in a great abundance. At every low tide thousands of the poor 

 people crowd on the flat to dig the edible Lamellibranchs. In his 

 collecting trip to that district in July 1887 Mr. Hatta observed the 

 following striking facts. It was after a season of heavy rain which 

 lasted twenty days or more that he visited that bay. The sandy 

 Hat was found entirely covered by a torelably thick layer of muddg 

 sediment which had been brought down by a brook (Asakawa) ruiminy 

 into the creek. All the Lamellibranchs had been completely destroyed 

 under these unfavorable circumstances and were found already 

 putrified emitting a horrible smell, and poor villagers were very much 

 vexed at having thus lost their living. To his great surprise Mr. Hatta 

 found that Lingula alone had continued to tire in as e.rcellent a condition 

 as it had ever been. 



It is a very striking phenomenon that Lingula has continued to 

 live since the Cambrian period and much more so that its form has 

 undergone but little change during such a vast length of time. There 

 is an interesting incident which I have recently learned from 

 Pkof. Dean. It is as follows. Morsk succeeded in carrying home 

 to America with him living specimens of Japanese Lingula, and he had 

 satisfaction of placing living specimens upon a ledge of Cambrian limestone 

 among the primaeval but hardly different shells of their ancestors ! 



Lingula had already acquired as long ago as the Cambrian period 

 an organisation most favorable for facing all the ambient conditions, 

 physical as well as chemical, that have taken place since that time, and 

 there seems to have been no necessity for improving their adaptations 

 to the environment. 



Zoological Laboratory, 



Imperial University, Tokyo. 



October, 1901. 



