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Show 132 PROF. HUXLEY ON THE OVIDUCTS OF OSMERUS. [MAR. 20, SUMMARY OF BRITISH SPECIES. E. 50 4 4 12 3 1 17 3 7 3 3 9 4 8 128 S. V. 23 4 2 • • • • a * 1 1 1 2 13 5 ... 52 W.V. 6 • • * • • • 9 ... ... 13 2 1 31 0. V. 51 10 7 13 • • • 13 17 1 1 1 2 4 1 19 13 6 6 165 Total. 130 18 11 27 3 14 44 5 1 9 7 4 1 48 29 10 15 376 I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VTT VIII. IX. X. XI. XII. XIII. XIV. XV. XVI. XVII. Accipitres Steganopodes Herodiones . Columba; Pterocletes . Gallinas Fulicarias Alectorides . Heinipodii Graviaa Tubinares 1. Contributions to Morphology. Ichthyopsida. - No. 2. On the Oviducts of Osmerus; with Remarks on the Relations of the Teleostean with the Ganoid Fishes. By Prof. H U X L E Y , F.R.S. [Eeceived March 9, 1883.] Nearly sixty years ago, one of the most accurate and prolific of modern anatomists and embryologists, Rathke, published a memoir on the alimentary canal and the reproductive organs of fishes1, which is not the least valuable of its author's numerous and weighty contributions to science. At p. 122 Rathke writes : - " I n certain fishes the oviducts have entirely disappeared ; this is the case in the Eel, in the Sturgeon2, in Cobitis tania, and in the Lamprey. In others, however, such as the higher kinds of Salmonoids, there extends back, behind each ovary, a narrow band which may be regarded as the remains of an oviduct. In all these fishes, therefore, the central abdominal cavity must take the place of the oviduct, as it receives the eggs when they are detached, and allows them to make their exit by a single opening at its posterior extremity. 1 H. Eathke, " Ueber den Darmkanal und die Zeugungsorgane der Fische," Schriften der naturforschendeu Gesellschaft zu Danzig, Heft iii. Band 24. 2 Eathke, taking the structure of ordinary osseous fish as his standard, says justly enough that the " oviducts [such as these fish possess] have disappeared " in the Sturgeon. In Cobitis barbatula the single ovary has an oviduct of the same character as in other Cyprinoid fishes. I have not examined C. tenia, about which, in other parts of his memoir, Eathke's statements are full and precise. |
