638 
SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 
of the hooks and the form of the suckers, which are frequent in the 
Taeniidse. The intermediate host is also different, for Grassi and 
Rovelli have shown that, in Sicily, Tsenia cuneata has as such Alolobo- 
phora fcetida, which is not found in Brazil. 
Notes on Cestodes.* — Dr. C. W. Stiles has a short note on Tsenia 
giardi, a species which has been the subject of some discussion as to its 
genital pores. The author states that they are generally alternate, as 
Rivolta and Neumann assert ; at the same time, it is not rare to find 
segments with double genital pores, as described by Blanchard and 
Moniez. It often happens that quite a series of female organs are found 
developed on one side of a segment, while on the opposite side there are 
rudimentary female organs. 
As Tsenia {M.oniezia') expansa is at present so diagnosed as to include 
two, if not three, distinct species found in Sheep and Oxen, Dr. Stiles 
has made an examination of some of the segments of the original example 
of Rudolphi. In them there are to be found near the posterior edge 
rounded organs, much larger than testes (with which, perhaps, they had 
been confounded) ; these are small caeca which arise from the boundary 
between two successive rings, and project into the parenchyma of the 
anterior ring. The sac is hounded by an invagination of the cuticle of 
the worm, which is surrounded by a, possibly, glandular tissue, which 
stains very deeply. The author gives a short notice of an allied species, 
which he proposes to call Moniezia ( Tsenia ) planissima. 
5. Incertse Sedis. 
Philodinidae.t — Dr. 0. Janson gives a very useful and valuable 
summary of our present knowledge of this difficult family, including the 
result of his own researches. The essay consists of three parts : — Part i. 
deals with the anatomy, part ii. with the biology or habits, and part iii. 
with the classification of the Philodinidee, giving at the same time a 
complete diagnosis of every recognized species, fifty -two in all. Some 
previously described species are excluded as not sufficiently known, and 
the following six species are described as new : — Callidina longirostris , 
C. vorax , C. EJirenbergii , Adineta tuberculosa , A. barbata , and A. gracilis . 
In the anatomical part Dr. Janson maintains Dr. Plate’s view that 
the Philodinidse have no separate contractile vesicle, but that the two 
lateral canals coalesce and form a short single tube which then enters 
the posterior part of the intestine or cloaca, which itself is contractile 
and contracts regularly. With regard to the function of the contractile 
vesicle in Rotifers the author agrees with Cosmovici,| who has stated 
his belief that the character of the contractile vesicle has hitherto been 
misunderstood, and that anatomically it is nothing but a cloaca having 
the function of driving out the water which has passed through the 
digestive tube, and not of expelling excretions from the perivisceral 
fluid. It must be stated, however, that while plausible enough in the 
case of the Pliilodinidae, this view utterly breaks down when other 
* Bull. Soc. Zool. France, xvii. ("1892) pp. 157-9. 
f “ Versuch einer Uebersicht iiber die Rotatorien-Familie der Philodinaeen,” 
von Dr. Otto Janson, Abhandl. des Naturw. Yer. Bremen, xii. (1893). Also 
printed separately, Marburg, 1893, 85 pp., 5 pis. 
% This Journal, 1888, p. 955. 
