THE
ESSEX NATURALIST
BEING THE
Journal of the Essex Field Club
FOR 1899 AND 1900.
(VOLUME XI.)
BRITISH WELL-WORMS, (PHREORYCTES),
WITH ESPECIAL REFERENCE TO A
UNIQUE SPECIMEN FROM CHELMSFORD,
ESSEX.
By the Rev. HILDERIC FRIEND.
[Read February 33th, 1899.]
TOWARDS the end of 1895, Mr. Frank Beddard, M.A.,
Prosector to the Zoological Society of London, brought
out his magnificent Monograph of the Oligochaeta. It was the only
attempt that has yet been made in England to bring our know-
ledge of earthworms and fresh water annelids up-to-date, and
may be regarded as the basis upon which all future work in this
department of biological research must rest. In this splendid
work we find several pages devoted to the study of a genus of
annelids known as "Well-worms," and the following sentence is,
for us, of peculiar interest. "The genus Phreoryctes has been
found in a good many parts of Europe (not in England) and in
New Zealand, and in North America." Thus we learn
definitely that in 1895 no species of Well-worm had been found
in this country, or at least that no species had been described as
native with us.
It now appears that there had been a solitary specimen of a
new species of Phreoryctes in my possession for three years
previous to the publication of the Monograph. Owing to the
scantiness of the material, however, and the fact that we had no
definite clue to the history of the worm, the remark of Mr.
Beddard has remained practically unaltered till the present time.