148 
Haemogregarines 
garines. As he has not studied the complete cycle of a haemogregarine 
in the blood and organs of his snakes, I fail to see how he is in a position 
to make the statements I have quoted above. In criticising my remarks 
on his schizonts and sporonts he says: “After declaring that he cannot 
recognise any specific difference between the haemogregarines from 
different genera and families of snakes, Captain Patton goes on to admit 
that he is unable to recognise any difference of stage in the development 
of any of the many examples examined.” This is a misstatement and 
clearly exemplifies Dr Sambon’s method of controversy. I have nowhere 
said I could not recognise any differences in the stages of development 
of snake or other haemogregarines, whether they be from the peripheral 
blood or from the organs of their hosts. If Dr Sambon will only read 
my paper carefully he will find it stated, that I have examined many 
examples of all these stages, but that I am not in a positiou at present 
to interpret them as young forms, adult sporonts, and adult schizonts; 
this is what I admitted, a very different thing to what Dr Sambon tries to 
infer. I also said that, “ without infecting a snake through the agency of 
the right tick, and then studying the various forms of the parasites that 
appear in the blood and organs of the snake, I do not see how it is 
possible to speak of the parasites in the peripheral blood as schizonts, 
sporonts, etc.” Dr Sambon has carefully avoided this sentence, and 
ridicules the previous one by saying that he fails to understand the 
significance of the presence or absence of ticks on snakes; he reminds 
me that we do not diagnose the species of malarial parasite by deter¬ 
mining the kind of mosquito which ingests the parasite. This I should 
think is quite obvious to anyone; as Dr Sambon is not in a position to 
appreciate my remarks on ticks and snake haemogregarines I will explain 
it further. 
The method of multiplication of the haemogregarines of snakes in 
their lungs and livers is a complicated process, two distinct cysts being 
formed which contain two forms of the parasites. On examining 
infected snakes, I have found that both these cysts are almost invariably 
present, and that it is quite impossible to say whether one or both 
represent schizogony, or a modified form of sporogony; at present I am 
inclined to the latter view. If it is impossible to express a definite 
opinion on the nature of these cysts and their contents, it is in my 
opinion equally impossible to sa} 7 what stages the parasites in the 
peripheral blood represent. In order therefore to overcome this 
difficulty another method of studying these parasites must be adopted. 
A number ot infected snakes harbouring ticks should first be collected; 
