of Edinburgh, Session 1885-86. 
451 
5. Observations on the Structure of Lumbricus complanatus, 
Duges. By Frank E. Beddard, M.A., F.R.S.E., F.Z.S., 
Prosector to the Zoological Society of London. 
A very considerable number of earthworms have been referred to 
the genus Lumbricus , and its immediate allies Dendrobcena , Allolo- 
bophora, &c., which have in reality no marked affinities with any 
of these genera. Such are, for example, Lumbricus corethrurus of 
Fritz Muller, which Perrier has shown to belong to a distinct generic 
type described by him under the name of Urochceta , and Lumbricus 
microchceta of Rapp, which is also the type of a new genus, widely 
differing from Lumbricus proper. On the other hand, a very large 
number of species have been referred to the latter genus, concerning 
which there is little or no knowledge, so that it is impossible to 
speak with any certainty as to their exact systematic position. 
."No less than fifty-nine such species are enumerated by Vejdovsky, 
in his lately-published System und Morphologie der Oligochceten , 
some of which, however, are evidently members of the genus 
Lumbricus , or its immediate allies. In the memoir referred to, 
which is not merely a record of new observations, but a thoroughly 
digested summary of previous work upon the subject, Dr Vejdovsky 
only allows three species that can be at present unhesitatingly 
assigned to the genus Lumbricus; of the other Lumbrici , eighteen 
species belong to Eisen’s genera Tetragonurus , Allolobophora, Allurus, 
and Dendrobcena ; twenty-eight probably belong to one of the four 
genera enumerated, while thirty-two may or may not (in some cases, 
e.g., L. microchceta certainly not) belong to any of these genera ; 
they are put under the head of “species inquirendae.” It is with 
one of these latter that the present paper deals. I do not, however, 
wish to identify the species that I am about to describe with 
Lumbricus complanatus of Dugks without a certain reservation. 
Absolutely nothing is known about the structure of by far the 
majority of the species of Lumbricus ; and it is evidently therefore 
a matter of impossibility to determine its systematic position with 
any pretence to accuracy. 
The following observations rest upon the examination of a single 
