ARTEMIA. 
55 
Bibliographical History . — We are indebted to Dr. 
Schlosser for the first extended notice of this little animal, 
though he mentions it as having been indicated a short 
time previously in the £ Journal Britannique/ In October 
1755, having visited the saltworks at Lymington, in 
Hampshire, he went to examine the salterns, or reservoirs 
where the brine is deposited previous to its being boiled. 
In this strong liquor he discovered a vast number of small 
insects, of a red colour, which tinged the whole cistern. 
These he examined with care, watched all their motions 
as they gambolled in their native element, and noticed the 
great difference which distinguishes the male from the 
female. Having made a tolerably accurate drawing, he 
wrote a description of them, and sent it in a letter to M. 
Gautier, in Paris, who had just at that time discovered a 
method of engraving in colours, and was engaged in pub- 
lishing his work called ‘ Observations periodiques sur la 
Physique/ This letter appeared in the year following, 
1756, with figures of the animal, male and female. 
Schlosser tells us that they were called by the workmen 
brine-worms, and are chiefly to be found when the liquor 
is very strong. Linnaeus, in his tenth edition of the 
‘ Systema Naturae/ 1758, shortly describes it under the 
name of Cancer salinus , and Pabricius, in his ‘ Entomolog. 
Systemat./ 1775, places it in the genus Gammarus, under 
the name of G. salinus. No particular description of the 
little creature, however, appears to be given by any per- 
sonal observer after Schlosser’ s time, till the Rev. Mr. 
Rackett called the attention of the members of the Linnean 
Society to it, by reading a paper at their meeting, on the 
16th of June, 1812, which was published in the eleventh 
volume of their ‘Transactions/ in the year 1815. Mr. 
Rackett informs us, it is called the Lymington shrimp, or 
brine-worm, and that it occurs in greatest number in the 
salt-pits or reservoirs, where the liquor obtains the strength 
of a quarter of a pound of salt to the pint of water. 
When this liquor, he says, becomes much diluted with 
rain-water, a few only are visible in it. 
