08 DR. CHISHOLM ON THE MALIS DRACUNCULUS. 
statement. Mr. F. might have added next, that if the optic 
nerves suffer, or if the acoustic nerve be injured, I denied that 
blindness was the result in the one case, and deafness in the 
other. 
I have merely to add, in conclusion, that I shall take no notice 
of any remarks which Mr. F. (or any body) may make upon the 
foregoing opinions, because in his last the illustrations were so 
unhappy, the arguments so “weak and worn out,” and the 
general tone of feeling so ill-natured, and but were I to 
select another sentence for comment out of the March number, 
Mr. F. would never, perhaps, be able to forgive me for so doing, 
so I will conclude. 
DR. CHISHOLM ON THE MALIS DRACUNCULUS. 
[Continued from vol. ix, page 645.] 
In order to explain the variety which appears in the foregoing 
extract, it may be useful to advert to the species of this worm 
which more directly comes under the designation of that infest- 
ing the human body, commonly known by the name of the 
guinea-worm. Sauvages includes under the generic name 
Malis, a number of insects which certainly have no relation to 
each other. Had the name been confined to those which the 
word properly applies to, jumentorum bovum pecorumqae 
morbi, it might have been more correct. Linnaeus, no doubt 
aware of this, uses the generic name Gordius, and confines it to 
those insects which have a natural affinity to each other. He 
gives five species : — 1. The aquaticus ; 2. The argillaceus ; 
3. The medinensis ; 4. The marinus ; and, 5. The lacustres. 
The three first are undoubtedly frequently confounded or mis- 
taken for each other. They, indeed, equally infect the human 
body when it is exposed to them in the situations they peculiarly 
affect ; but in their origin, and in their specific character, they 
may be readily distinguished. Barbut adopts the division of 
Linnaeus, and gives coloured figures of them, distinctly shewing 
the difference. The first is thus distinguished, “ pallidus ex- 
treinitatibus nigris;” the second, “ flavescens, extremitatibus 
concoloribus and the third, “ totus pallidus.” The specimens 
of the third, which I had the honour of sending to Dr. Monro, 
senior, in the year 1794, will manifest that they were the true 
Guinea worm. When Barbut says that the first is that which in 
Guinea, and in some other hot countries, gets into the flesh of 
the natives and occasions great mischief, I am inclined to think 
