4 Transadiom of the Royal Mioroseopical Society. 
little colour by reflected light, but nearly opaque, and reticulated 
with dark lines well within the shell (Fig. 7 greatly magnified). 
Wherever the dark lines appear to cross there is a projection like a 
short tube, which is directed outwards to the shell, but does not 
quite reach it, being stopped probably by an inner membrane. It 
bears also a dark mark like a suture all round the egg at about 
one-third from the end. That the term " winter egg " applied 
often to this form is a misnomer there can scarcely be a doubt, for 
I have found them in every month in the year ; but my belief is (as 
has been suspected of the ephippial eggs of the Entomostraca) that 
these eggs are destined to preserve the species through the drought 
to which the ponds, that the animals flourish in, are constantly 
liable. On a pood drying up, the clusters of rotifers, holding the 
ephippial eggs, sink to the bottom, are dried in the mud, and 
development probably suspended, only to be renewed in the next 
rainy season. 
On breaking one of the ephippial eggs it appeared to contain 
only extremely small granules, from which fact it may be supposed 
to be very slightly developed when first deposited. Trying to 
imitate the conditions existing in their native pond, I saved some 
of these eggs in their surrounding clear slime, allowed them to 
dry spontaneously in a small glass tank, kept them dry for a 
month, and have since supplied them with water during some ten 
months, occasionally looking at them with a low power. But one 
cannot stare continuously for many months even at a rotifer, and 
during this time some have mysteriously disappeared, and some 
remain, little altered, except that they are more transparent, the 
markings grown fainter, and altogether more resemble the ordinary 
eggs. Thus the evidence of this experiment is all negative, but 
equally so are the results of the pond from which the original 
colonies were taken : it dried up, with myriads of ephippial eggs in 
it, in September 1875, again filled later on, but up to the end of 
last May yielded not a single group of Conochilus. Still there 
they are, and sooner or later must show themselves : each ephippial 
egg, I believe, will hatch out ; the young rotifer being very close 
to another (brought down with it in the gelatinous sphere holding 
many and gluing all together), will " swarm " with its neighbours 
{a la Lacinularia), and — behold a young group of Conochilus ! As 
few as six may be seen in a group, and these all apparently of one 
age ; but when the clusters contain many individuals, two or more 
generations may be generally recognized. 
The clear slimy secretion, more or less common to all rotifers, 
and so variously used by each species, plays a very important part 
in the economy of Conochilus, and one hitherto unsuspected ; the 
creatures are imbedded in it very closely as to their foot-tails, but 
more and more loosely in approaching the heads ; their extremities 
