The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online

RECORD: Darwin, C. R. 1880. [Earthworm research notes]. CUL-DAR64.1.83. Edited by John van Wyhe (The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online, http://darwin-online.org.uk/)

NOTE: See record in the Darwin Online manuscript catalogue, enter its Identifier here. Reproduced with permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library and William Huxley Darwin. The volume CUL-DAR64.1 contains material for Earthworms, experiments on worms; different locales & photographs and cuttings from journals. All of the textual items in these folders, including this one, have been transcribed in a single file: CUL-DAR63-65.

Jan 29th 1881 When the antcalc gland is constantly filled with a concretion, which by a wonderful act of [illeg] is excreted.

The lamellæ (which I certainly saw in some ant. glands) must be somehow reformed, & on a section of an ant. gland about [Francis] made after removing the large calc concretions, the section showed circular or oval passages lined with cells & filled with the so called oil — globules with opake central I therefore imagine that new lamellæ are formed by almost gradual & diverticula from the œsophagus, which are afterwards grown or are developed into the lamellæ. I may add, about the larger cells nucleus and nucleolus. Why the calciferous form cells into

83v

calc. concretion in the ant. glands & only virtually & easily into small concretion in the posteriorglands I do not at all know.

Citation: John van Wyhe, ed. 2002-. The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online. (http://darwin-online.org.uk/)