FURTHER OBSERVATIONS ON OECAL PARASITES OF FOWLS. 61 
There is one interesting point in regard to the cteca of 
the newly hatched chick at a time before the yolk-sac is 
completely absorbed and before the animal has began to 
take food. In these cases the caeca are periodically filled 
with a bright green fluid, which gives all the characteristic 
reactions for bile-pigment. It would seem to us, therefore, 
that the caeca must play an important part in the economy of 
the fowl, since even in these young chicks, in which the 
intestine is practically empty, and the only stuff passing down 
is presumably the bile, every trace of this is collected for 
some time in the caeca on its way to the exterior. 
3. Methods. 
It is a common complaint amongst workers on rectal 
parasites that division forms are relatively rare : e. g. Dobell, 
in his paper on the “Intestinal Protozoa of Frogs and Toads,” 
says regarding Trichomastix batrachorum, on p. 209, 
“stages in division are very difficult to find”; and again, as 
regards Trichomonas batrachorum, on p. 217, “I have 
not found so many division stages in Trichomonas as in 
Trichom as tix, but the likeness between them is so great 
that I have little doubt that they correspond almost identi- 
cally. ^ 
And, in fact, one of the most recent workers on these 
forms — Bensen, in his paper on “Trichomonas intesti- 
nalis und vaginalis des Menschen ” — only refers to the 
possibility of division of the active flagellates in the following 
passage, p. 122: “ Daneben konnen auf dem Amoboidstadium 
und irn Anfang der Cysten bildung, nach friiheren Beobachtern 
auch im Flagellatzustand, Vermehrungen durch gewolinliche 
Zweiteilung stattfinden.” 
This is, we believe, largely due to the fact that the smears 
used by these workers were made from the rectal content, 
whereas, as far as can be found in the fowl and the fish 
which we have examined, the chief dwelling-place of these 
parasites is in the layer of mucus separating the gut content 
