44 
Psyche 
[June 
Beorn Cooper, n. gen. 
(Fig. i; Plate 6, Figs. 1-5) 
Desci iption : Mouth without discernible palps or other appendages, 
dorsally and laterally enclosed by a well-defined cuticular frontal 
element which caps and delineates the “head”; no cephalic appendages, 
no lateral cirrus, no clava, and no discernible eye-spots. Body naked; 
cuticle evidently regionally thickened dorsally, annulated by trans- 
verse lines of flexion, but not sclerotized into distinct exoskeletal 
plaques either dorsally or ventrally. Legs moderately long, tele- 
scopable; each leg with four claws (or 2 two-branched claws ?), and 
with a short, anterior, flattened, apical cuticular extension or spine, 
but without lateral or basal papillae. 
Genotype: Beorn leggi Cooper, n. sp. 
Origin of name: The name Beorn is that of the now storied magical 
bear of the Wilderland in the Third Age of Middle-earth. “Some say 
that he is a bear descended from the great and ancient bears of the 
mountains . . .” ( J. R. R. Tolkien, 1937, The Hobbit) . 
Beorn leggi Cooper, n. sp. 
(Fig. 1 ; Plate 6, Figs. 1-5) 
Description: Of subaverage size: 0.3 mm long by 0.08 mm wide. 
Convex above, flattened ventrally. Cuticle of head without eyespots, 
of body smooth and without noticeable sculpture — at most very 
finely coriaceous; transversely crossed by four main furrows, or lines 
of flexion, which divide the body into five regions : P - the prostomial 
(“head”) region, I - the first segment bearing leg pair-I ventrolat- 
erally, II - the second segment bearing legs-II, III - the third segment 
bearing legs-III, and IV - the terminal segment bearing legs-IV. The 
relative proportions of the body regions just defined are: P (1) : II 
(1.3) : III (1.3) : IV (2+). Whereas each of the four major 
annular furrows encircles the body region, region-I has a short, 
transverse furrow just posterior to the middle, and regions-II and 
-III are each in turn divided dorsally by a secondary furrow just 
anterior to their midpoints; the lateral extensions of these secondary 
furrows fade just anterior to the base of the corresponding leg. In 
contrast, segment IV has a secondary furrow that extends ventrally 
but fades out dorso-medially. 
Apically and anteriorly each leg has a short, scale-like projection 
of the cuticle, or perhaps flattened spine (that of leg-I being most 
prominent), and a cuff-like fold at midlength which strongly suggests 
that the leg may telescope. There are four claw-rays per leg, of which 
the middle two of each leg are the more dorsal. If the pairs of claws 
