Lankester's ‘Gregarine’ from the Eggs of Thalassema neptuni

Abstract

OUR attention has been directed by Mr. A. D. Hobson, of the University of Edinburgh, to a sporozoan that attacks the developing eggs in the genital pouches (nephridial sacs) of the echiuroidworm Thalassema neptuni Gärtner. Of twelve females examined at Plymouth this autumn, eight showed a heavy infection. It is clear that the parasite is the ‘Gregarine’ observed by Ray Lankester in the eggs of one mature female among those he collected on the south coast of Devon and briefly mentioned in a paper published in 1881 (Zool. Anz., Jahrg. 4, p. 250). Prof. and Mrs. Goodrich in their paper on Gonospora minchinii (Quart., Jour. Microsc. Sc., vol. 65, p. 157; 1921) refer to Lankester's notes, but no one seems to have investigated further the organism from Thalassema.