632 
DR. T. WILLIAMS ON THE BLOOD-PROPER AND 
to examination were obtained : — ‘‘The blood was most readily obtained for examina- 
tion from the abdominal vessel, but in extracting it care was required against its 
becoming mixed with the secretion poured out from the skin in great abundance 
when the animal is wounded,” p. 94. Mr. Jones then observes, “The corpuscles of 
the blood of the Earth-worm are remarkable for their great size, being on an average 
•jlVoth 0^' of an inch in diameter. They are both granular and nucleated 
cells.” Thence this author proceeds to an elaborate account of the metamorphoses 
which these two varieties of corpuscles undergo. And with reference to the Leech 
Mr. Jones affirms, “ that while the corpuscles of the blood of the Earth-worm are the 
largest which I have yet found in any invertebrate animal, the corpuscles of the 
Leech are the smallest,” p. 95, op. cit. Investigations on an extended scale, and con- 
ducted with the strongest desire for the real truth, enable me in this place to state 
most confidently that in the descriptions cited, both from M. Milne-Edwards and 
Mr. Wharton Jones, these distinguished observers have fallen into the most extra- 
ordinary errors. In no single species among the Annelida does the blood-proper contain 
any morphotic elements whatever ! In all instances, without exception, it is a pei-fectly 
amorphous fluid, presenting under the highest powers of the best microscope no 
visible corpuscles or molecules or cells of any description whatever. It is a limpid 
liquid variously coloured, as formerly and correctly stated by Milne-Edwards, in 
different species. 
In a memoir* recently published, M. Quatrefages has re-traversed the ground first 
opened by Milne-Edwards. M. Quatrefages confirms, without a single exception, 
the conclusions at which his colleague had previously arrived. Historic truth 
demands it to be stated that M. Quatrefages, in the memoir cited, has improved 
very little upon the original description of Milne-Edwards, and in that little he has 
become entangled in error. 
In the Arenicoloe and Eunice he describes proboscidian and branchial hearts, 
which do not exist. M. Quatrefages seems to have doubtfully recognised the 
general fact of the Jluidity of the blood-proper of the Annelida. He cites however in 
I the same paragraph such striking exceptions to this fact, that he gives no proofs 
whatever of having mentally realized the law which demands that the true-blood of 
the Annelida should he invariably fluid, non-corpusculated, because in this class the 
office which devolves upon the floating cells is performed in the chylaqueous fluid, 
where alone such cells exist. This remarkable principle, which literally divides the 
nutritious fluid into two parts, upon one of which the corpuscular agency devolves, 
upon the other the more special duties of solid nutrition, seems not in the least degree, 
at any time, to have entered the mind of M. Quatrefages. 
“ Dans deux especes de Glyc^res de la Manche, qui toutes deux sont assez com- 
munes a Saint-Vaast, j’ai trouve un sang fortement colore en rouge par des globules 
* Etudes sur les types inferieurs de I’embranchement des Anneles, sur la circulation des Annelides. Annales 
des Sciences Naturelles, 1850. 
