304 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 
multipolar nerve-cells in Astacus, and Las succeeded in showing the 
definite connection between the cells and the branches of the nerves. 
Amphipods from Copenhagen Museum.* * * § — Rev. T. R. R. Stebbing 
discusses nine genera and ten species, six of each being new. “ Some of 
the species are so like their previously known neighbours that a short- 
sighted person might think them not worth distinguishing. Others stand 
oddly apart, with so queer a combination of characters that more than 
one existing family must look at them askance.” “ Opinions will differ 
on the policy of promptly establishing new families for eccentric forms, 
or of postponing that responsibility to as late a date as possible.” “ In 
the amiable endeavour to oblige the partisans of either view,” the author 
“ offers tentatively a new family for one of these perplexing species, 
boldly assigns one to an old family, and leaves one for the present- 
homeless.” 
New Copepods from the Clyde.| — Messrs. T. and A. Scott describe 
Stephos Fultoni sp. n., Dactylopus pectinatus sjj. n., and Eurynotus insolens 
g. et sp. n., additions to the faunal list of the Clyde area. 
Choniostomatidae.J — Herr H. J. Hansen has monographed this 
family of Copepoda, parasitic on Malacostracan Crustacea. He describes 
43 species in place of the five previously known. The larval and post- 
larval development of numerous forms has been investigated. The re- 
lations of parasite and host, e.g. the frequently ensuing castration of 
the latter, are fully discussed. As a reviewer (F. Zschokke) says, 
Hansen’s work is so thorough that there is now no group of parasitic 
Copepods better known than the Clioniostomatidae. 
Trilobites and Crustaceans.§ — Mr. C. E. Beecher gives an outline of 
a natural classification of the Trilobites. This includes a diagnosis 
brought up to date ; a detailed comj^arison (as to eighteen features) be- 
tween Trilobites, Entomostraca, and Malacostraca ; a summing up of 
what is known as to the development ; and a classification into the three 
orders : Hypoparia, Opisthoparia, and Proparia. 
Annulata. 
Earthworms of Madagascar Region. || — Dr. W. Michaelsen de- 
scribes about two dozen species from Madagascar, the Seychelles, and 
the Mascarenes. They may be ranked in tw r o groups : — (a) forms intro- 
duced by man, e.g. Benliamia bolavi, Eudrilus eugenise, Pontoscolex core- 
thrurus, Megascolex armcitus , and some species of Perichseta ; ( b ) endemic 
forms, such as the dominant genus Eynotus, a generalised type near the 
common root of the Lumbricini and Geoscolccini, and three sj)ecies of 
Acanthodrilus, a genus which the author believes to have been almost 
cosmopolitan in distant geological periods. 
Supposed Auditory Cells in Pontoscolex.1[ — Dr. G. Eisen has studied 
the peculiar cells which occur in the equatorial line of each segment in 
* Trans. Linn. Soc. (Zool.), vii. (1897) pp. 25-45 (9 pis.). 
+ Ann. Nat. Hist., i. (7th ser.) 1898, pp. 185-90 (2 pis.). 
X Copenhagen, 4to, 205 pp., 13 pis. See Zool. Centralbl., v. (1898) pp. 181-8. 
§ Amer. Journ. Sci., iii. (1897) pp. 89-207 (1 pi.). 
jj Abh. Senckenberg. Nat. Gesell., xxi. (1897) pp. 217-52 (3 figs.). 
Festschrift f. Lilljeborg, Upsala, 1896 (received 1898), 16 pp. and 2 pis. 
