Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 1 (1843).djvu/224

196 never seen them swim about as the animals of the genus Cypris do, but when shaken out of their lurking-places into a tumbler of water, they descend in gyrations until they reach the bottom, and then they creep along the surface of the vessel till they reach any vegetable matter they can find; upon this they creep along searching for food. In this habit they differ very widely from the beautiful little insects belonging to the genus Daphnia, which, from their long and mostly feathered rami and branchial feet, are well fitted for swimming about. In the 'Annals and Magazine of Zoology and Botany' for 1837, I described four species as inhabitants of Britain. Since that time I have ascertained the existence of several more, one of which I have never met with but in one spot, a stagnant pool in the old St. Pancras road, nearly opposite old St. Pancras church;—a pool which, in a year or two, will have changed its character from a habitat for Daphniae, to a resting-place for brick houses and the residence of human beings.—This species has been described and figured by Jurine in his work on the Monoculi of the environs of Geneva, but has never been noticed till now as an inhabitant of Great Britain.

Daphnia brachiata. The length of this little creature is about half a line. The shell is of an olive colour, transparent, showing the stomach &c. very distinctly. It bulges out very much posteriorly, giving the insect a very jolly appearance, and is ciliated anteriorly. The main stalk of the rami is very large and fleshy looking; the under edge, for about half its length from the base, being crenated, and having two short setae springing from one of the crenations or small lobes at about the middle of its length; the upper edge is serrated. The anterior branch of the rami has four articulations, the first one very short. On the inner edge a rudimentary seta springs from it, and another from the outer edge of the second articulation. One long seta springs from the third, and three long setae from the last articula