
NOTICES OF MEETINGS. 189 

dry the elaters are uncurled and expanded, and upon moisture being supplied to 
them, they costract and coil round the spore, 
LIVERPOOL MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY.—On Friday, June the 2nd, 
Mr. E. J. Sing, B.A., read a paper on “ The Anatomy of Cydippe.” Having 
made a few remarks on the Ctenophora generally, he proceeded to describe 
minutely the distribution of the gastrovascular canals and the peculiar organs of 
group—the Ctenophores,—pointing out that the Cydippe might be taken as the 
most primitive form, as the various organs have in it the least complexity. 
The various organs at the aboral pole of the animal were then described, 
special attention being directed to the structure of the auditory organ. The 
development of the individual was then followed up, the discrepancies between 
the statements of Kowalesky and Agassiz being pointed out. Several 
diagrams of the distribution of the gastrovascular canals, and the relative 
positions of the various organs, were exhibited, and Mr. Sing concluded by 
pointing out the obvious resemblance of the gastrovascular canals of the 
Ctenophoree to the body cavity in those animals (Echinoderms, Amphioxus, 
etc.), in which it grows out from the archenteron as lateral diverticula. 
The President pointed to the fact that we have in Polyzoa and Vorticella 
distinct bands of cilia differentiated for certain purposes, and asked whether any 
difference existed between the phosphorescence of Noctiluca and that of the 
Ctenophoree. 
Mr. Sing replied that it did not strike one as natural that the phosphorescence 
after irritation had primarily been evolved as a protection, and said he had 
observed in Noctilula the light proceeded from the region of the nucleus and the 
intersections of the protoplasmic threads, but was ignorant as to whence it 
proceeded in the Ctenophore. The agglutination of the cilia he held to be 
unique. 
MANCHESTER MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY. —The ordinary meeting 
of the Manchester Microscopical Society was held on Thursday, June 8th, in 
the Lecture Hall of the Mechanics’ Institution, the President, Mr. Thomas 
Brittain, F.R.M.S., in the chair. Interesting communications were made by 
Mr. Wolstenholme, M.R.C.V.S., Mr. Ward, F.R.M.S., and the president. 
A donation of slides of mosses, gathered in the ramble to Staley Brushes, was 
made by Mr. Miles. 
Mr. Parkes, of Rhodes, exhibited a quaint microscope which had been figured 
in Baker's treatise on the Microscope published 140 years ago. The stand was 
designed by Messrs. Culpepper and Scarlet as an improvement on Marshall’s 
stand, it is therefore the second form of stand sold in England. The body is 
made of bone and cardboard, strengthened by brass pillars. The object glasses 
magnify from 30 to 200 diameters. This particular instrument has somewhat 
of a local history, it having belonged to Sir Ashton Lever, of Alkrington Hall, 
near Middleton. He had at one time the largest private museum in England, 
and in 1783 an Act was obtained to enable him to dispose of his collection by 
lottery, which he did for £10,000. It was won by a Mr. Parkinson, who 
exhibited it for a time and then disposed of it. At the sale this instrument 
was bought by a Middleton entomologist, who shortly before his death, some 
three years since, handed it over to the Botanical Society of that town, in 
whose possession it still remains. 
Mr. G. J. Johnson read a paper on Insectivorous Plants, the Sundews and 
the Bladderworts. Specimens of Drosera rotundifolia and Utricularia vulgaris 
were distributed among the members present, and photographs of the same, the 
work of Mr. Johnson, were also freely distributed. At the conversazione which 
followed, Mr. Stanley exhibited Mosses and Hepatics collected at Staley 
Brushes; Mr. R. Parkes, fish scales and foot of scorpion fly; Mr. eB: Wolsten- 
holme, the head and neck of the slave Zenda solium found in the brain of a 
