During a part of the years 1937 and 1938 a biological study of the fresh-water mollusca of the Tanganyika Territory and Zanzibar Protectorate was carried out with the aid of the grant of the Wandsworth Scholarship of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Up to the present little has been known about the molluscs of this part of Africa, although the importance of certain members of this group as the intermediate hosts of human blood flukes (Schistosoma spp.) has been widely recognized. The following account of the constitution and distribution of the molluscan fauna of this region may therefore be of interest and value.

The well-known deposits of early Upper Devonian age at Scaumenac Bay, P.Q., Canada, have yielded numerous specimens of the rather primitive Dipnoan which is now known as Scaumenacia curta (Whiteaves). During the summer of 1984 one of the authors (W. G.-S.) obtained at this locality three specimens of a very distinct new Dipnoan, characterised by an elongated head and other features. Three other specimens of this new form [No. P. 6785 in the British Museum (Nat. Hist.), the anal fin-skeleton of which was figured by Woodward (1893, p. 241) under the name Scaumenacia curta (Whiteaves), and two in the Royal Scottish Museum] were subsequently recognised in museum collections, but the present account is based entirely on the three specimens mentioned above. From these it has been possible to describe almost the whole skeleton, except the endocranium, and to compare it, in some detail, with those of other primitive Dipnoi; in this comparison we have used the results of work by Porster-Cooper (1937) on Dipterus and by one of the present authors (T. S. W., nearing completion) on certain primitive Dipnoi.

Until recently the taxonomic and phylogenetic relationships of some of the Carboniferous plants in the two genera, Dactylotheca and Senftenbergia, could not be defined with any clear degree of certainty. The main reason for this was that workers who had investigated these types had failed to reveal some of their most important structural features. In the past, therefore, it has been impossible with the information available to make adequate comparisons of the types included in these genera. In a previous paper the writer (1938) showed that one at least of the three species of Dactylotheca really belonged to the genus Senftenbergia, and demonstrated that it possessed several Schizæaceous characteristics indicating its alliance with the living ferns of that family. In the present work, an analysis of the structural features of the two remaining species of Dactylotheca, and of one species of Senftenbergia has been made. These three plants are Dactylotheca Sturi Sterzel pro. var., Dactylotheca parallela Kidston, and Senftenbergia pennœformis Brongniart. The experiments on the compressions of D. parallela, however, indicate quite clearly that the plant does not belong to either the genus Dactylotheca or Senftenbergia. Its fructifications were found to be of the nature of synangia and were exannulate. Of these two features, the former removes it from Dactylotheca, and the latter prevents it from being classed within Senftenbergia. For this reason D. parallela cannot be included in the Schizæaceæ, and, therefore, the analysis of its structural features is not recorded in this paper.

The Mucorales have a wide geographical distribution and for seventy years they have been the subject of investigation both in Europe and in America. In this country, however,little research has been done on this group, the only workers being Bayliss-Elliott (1930) who has investigated the microflora of the Dovey salt marshes, Dale (1912, 1914) who examined the fungus flora of soil at Cambridge, and Brierley (1923, 1927, 1928) who has done considerable work on soil study. Although certain of the Mucorales were isolated by the last named, he was mostly concerned with the general methods of soil culture. The important quantitative technique was devised by Brierley (1927). Oudemans and Koning (1902) were the first to show the presence of Mucors in the soil. They examined the soil fungi in Holland and isolated two new species of Mucors. Möller (1903) investigated the fungi found in Pine mycorrhiza and obtained a further four new species. Hagem (1907, 1910) studied the morphology and physiology of seventeen Mucors from the soil of Norway, seven of which were new species. In 1908 Lendner published his “Les Mucorinées de la Suisse,” an important contribution to the study of this group of fungi. A criticism which might be levelled at this work is that it is difficult to ascertain from it whether or not Lendner used pure cultures on which to base his descriptions. He merely states that “dilution methods used in Bacteriology were employed,” no mention of monospore cultures being made. Further important work on this group has been done by Korpatschewska (1909), Namy-slowski (1906, 1920), Naumov (1914, 1924, 1935), Ling-Young (1930), Johann (1932), Jensen (1912, 1931), and in the Kryptogamenflora der Mark Brandenburg (1935) Zycha gives a complete revision of the classification of the Mucorales. A survey of the geographical distribution of this group of fungi is found in the work of Niethammer (1935), while further classification has been done by Linnemann (1936). In America, Povah (1917) and Waksman(1916, 1917, 1922, 1927) have both added considerably to our knowledge of the Mucorales in the soil.

At the time of his death Dr Duerden was contemplating the preparation of a paper of this nature, and it is felt by Mrs Duerden that had he been able to express his wishes in this connection he would appreciate a record of the conclusions made by him. No one realised more than Dr Duerden himself the gaps which are still present in our knowledge and interpretation of the grouping of follicles and fibres in the mammalia, and this work is certainly not meant to be taken as representing Dr Duerden's final view or those of his colleagues at the Wool Industries Research Association. In view of the unique value of much of the material the present notes are intended, therefore, to form a basis and reference, firstly, for workers engaged in the general development of any mammalian coat from a morphogenic and phylogenetic point of view, and secondly, for those interested particularly in factors concerned in the formation of different types of fleeces in sheep. The conception of the follicle bundle as a discrete and basic genetic unit largely determining the initial form of the wool staple is of the highest importance in studies on the inheritance and developmentof fleece characters.

Nearly sixty years ago fossil fishes were first discovered at Glencartholm, since when so much material has been collected from this locality that very few museums in the British Isles are without some representative of this remarkable fauna; remarkable both for the number of specimens collected and for the variety of forms it contains. One of us (J. A. M.-T.) became interested in this fauna while studying some of its more problematical members, and spent a few weeks collecting at Glencartholm during the summers of 1933, 1934, 1935 and 1936. During these visits a large quantity of new material was amassed which, when studied by modern methods with a low-powered binocular microscope under liquids, particularly xylol, revealed far more of the anatomy than it had been possible for earlier workers to describe. Some of these results have already been published and the present paper deals only with the Actinopterygians. The new descriptions in this work are not intended to be exhaustive accounts of all that is known of these fishes, but merely to serve as a supplement and summary to the excellent descriptions of Traquair. In so doing an attempt has been made to re-define all the genera and species, and in some cases it has been necessary to repeat the existing description, but where this has been done care has been taken to be as brief as possible. The definitions of the genera are only intended to apply to the species here described, and are consequently confined to characters which are determinable in these species. In certain cases species have been found to exist on brief and inadequate descriptions, in two species the type specimens being unfigured; in these cases the types have been figured, and new and more complete accounts given. Where the shape or ornament of a bone was indeterminable, it has been omitted without comment, in order to make the text as short as possible.

Precise information about the food of the brown trout is somewhat scanty, especially as regards the relation existing between diet and environmental fauna.

(a) Day (1887) points out that “food which (brown) trout consume is of various descriptions. … They do not object to little fish, as the minnow, loach, sticklebacks, etc., water rats, young birds, frogs, snails, slugs, worms, leeches, maggots, flies, beetles, moths, waterspiders and even a lizard.” He concluded that the “tastes of some differ from those of their companions.”

The author summarises recent reports regarding the appearance in Mesozoic rocks of Blanckenhorn's genus Dictyoconus, long supposed to have originated in the Middle Eocene. He figures and describes the best known of these Mesozoic forms, in order to place its age and generic attribution beyond question, and discusses the problem of its relationship to allied genera as affected by its early appearance. He then describes d'Orbigny's contemporary (Cretaceous) genus Orbitolina, with which Dictyoconus has often been confused, in order to show its radical difference in structure and the characteristics of forms which can be more justly regarded as related to it. He also discusses the genotype of Orbitolina, since the species lately quoted as such is unsuitable.

The collection of Actiniaria and Zoantharia made by the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition contains nineteen species, one of which, Porponia antarctica Carlgren, I described as a new species in 1914. In all there were six species from the Antarctic, three from the Falkland Islands, six from the west coast of Cape Province, three from the Cape Verde Islands, and one, not specifically determined, from Gough Island. The new species here described are Epiactis vincentina, Epiactis brucei, Sicyonis antarctica, and Palythoa vincentina. I have not thought it necessary to compile a complete list of the literature and synonyms of the species, since in the papers cited full information is given.

The material to be described here was taken from individuals of a school of Pseudorca crassidens, forty-one of which were stranded at Buddon Ness in the estuary of the Tay in November 1935. There is very little published work on this species beyond reports on the occurrence of stranded individuals. Beebe (1924) refers to six skeletons found on the shores of the Galapagos Archipelago, and West (1935) gave a preliminary account of a male fœtus taken from a female stranded in Wales. More recently, Peacock, Comrie, and Greenshields (1936) gave an account of the Tay specimens, while Fraser (1936) published a review of various strandings around our British coasts, and Gill (1935) has dealt with those stranded in South Africa (see abstract in Nature, September 1936). With regard to the reproductive system valuable assistance has been obtained from recent researches on other species by MacIntosh and Wheeler (1929), Wheeler (1930), Ommanney (1932), and Laurie (1937), published in Discovery Reports, while earlier papers, also on other species, by Schulte (1916) and Meek (1918) have also been consulted.