10 
Transactions of the Society. 
III. — Second List of New Rotifers since 1889. 
By Charles JF. Rousselet, F.R.M.S. 
{Bead 1 6th December , 1896.) 
In August 1893 I published in this Journal a list of 186 new 
species of Rotifers described since the publication of the Supplement 
to the Rotifera by Hudson and Gosse in 1889. Since then 109 more 
new names have been added, which I have tabulated in the list below, 
and I append a Bibliography of the works in which those new species 
are described or discussed. 
My warning to avoid making new species out of slight varieties, 
and my recommendation to supply good figures and descriptions have 
unfortunately had very little effect. Out of 19 new species of 
Brachionus not less than seven are mere varieties of B. baheri , and 
Mr. C. H. Turner has named a new American Asflanchna merely 
because he could find only one point at the extremity of the jaws 
of some A. brightivelli instead of two, the normal but variable form; 
if he were to examine all the dogs he could find for such minute 
differences it is certain he would have to make a distinct species out 
of every Canis familiar is living. 
Some authors, again, have made new species with contracted spirit 
specimens of soft-bodied illoricate rotifers, such as Floscularia, Notom- 
mata, CEcistes , &c., of which they could not possibly know any real 
distinctive character ; and an empty shell of Gosse’s Pomjohohjx com - 
flanata has been absurdly described as a new species of Notholca, 
“ with a posterior opening for the passage of the foot ” when a foot 
does not exist at all in this genus ! In a number of other cases the 
figures and descriptions are quite useless as aids to future identi- 
fication. 
If the duplication of names goes on at this rate it is certain great 
confusion will follow. A few protests against the practice have indeed 
been raised, and it would be very desirable and in the interest of 
science if students of the Rotifera would exercise more care and dis- 
cretion, and avoid giving new names on the slightest pretext, when it 
is well known that in many cases the original figures and descriptions 
are not perfect or complete, and that most species are liable to con- 
siderable variation. 
Where in the following list there is no doubt about the identity of 
the species with a known form that name has been added in brackets, 
and I have marked with a (?) those species which are bad, or quite 
insufficiently figured and described. 
The numbers refer to the Bibliography at the end. 
