1 66 CARL RICHARD MOORE. 



unripe eggs were used or where fertilized eggs, or eggs possessing 

 full membranes, were being used. In all these cases the egg was 

 entirely unresponsive to the active principle of sperm and Lillie 

 was led to believe that "this substance is necessary for fertiliza- 

 tion." If then this substance is bound or neutralized when the 

 egg is fertilized or has been activated by artificial means we should 

 not expect to obtain any agglutination action from cases where 

 the fertilization reaction was entirely absent; but where fertiliz- 

 able eggs are present we should be able to detect the fertilizin. 1 



The writer has carried out a large number of experiments with 

 eggs variously modified by agents, natural and artificial, to see 

 if it were possible to establish a curve of fertilizin exactly parallel 

 to that of the curve of fertilization. It was however realized 

 very early that such was not possible due in large part to factors 

 that enter in secondarily. Lillie ('14, page 545) has called atten- 

 tion to the fact that a destruction of part of the eggs in a given 

 lot leads to the liberation of substances that act antagonistically 

 toward fertilizin. From an experiment giving a very consider- 

 able agglutination reaction one obtains a complete absence of 

 it if the tube containing the eggs is shaken slightly causing eggs 

 to disintegrate. Some substance within the egg acts in such a 

 way that it masks the presence of fertilizin. To this antagonistic 

 substance Lillie has applied the name anti-fertilizin. Extracts 

 or secretions containing this substance do not reveal their true 

 content of fertilizin. Lillie's table (p. 546) shows the reaction 

 of such a solution. A dilution of the supernatant fluid 1/320 

 gives as strong an agglutination as the same extract undiluted, 

 but this is not true of a secretion from fresh eggs. The aggluti- 

 nation reaction is a function of the concentration of fertilizin 

 in the normal case but not so when anti-fertilizin is present. 



The supernatant fluid from eggs exposed to butyric acid for 

 2-5 minutes is usually quite colored due to broken down eggs 

 and the escape of substances from within the egg. After the 

 prolonged butyric acid treatment substances gradually escape 

 from the egg due no doubt to the increased permeability of the 



1 We must not be confused by instances where for purely physical reasons sperm 

 are barred from entrance to eggs. In all the above circumstances we have seen 

 from cytological preparations that sperm actually enter these eggs in large numbers. 



