46 R- R- HUMPHREY. 



pertinent comments: Kingsbury ('02) noted the occurrence of 

 lobes in the testis of Desmognathus. He says : " There seems to 

 be no absolute correlation of this condition with other structural 

 features of the salamander, save that the presence of two or more 

 enlargements occurs more often in fact, quite constantly in large 

 animals. A similar division of the testis into ' lobes ' occurs in 

 other salamanders with an elongated body, and has been noted in 

 Amphiuma and Spelerpes. 1 The segmented condition of the organ 

 in Ccecilians 2 is perhaps to be associated likewise with the elongated 

 form of the body." 



Champy, similarly, comments on the relation of body size to the 

 presence of the multiple type of testis. He believes that the vari- 

 ation in the number of lobes is correlated with that in the size of 

 the species. He found the lobes very .numerous in axolotl, more 

 numerous in Triton cristatits than in Triton pal mat us and Triton 

 punctatus, and least numerous in the salamanders, though the last- 

 named animals, he concedes, are of rather large size. Champy 

 further considers that among the individuals of any species the 

 number of lobes will be proportional to the size of the animal. He 

 states that animals reared with insufficient food remain small and 

 their testes develop few lobes, while an animal of one year, well 

 nourished, may possess a testis of numerous lobes. 



From my own observations on the testes of numerous species of 

 American urodeles it would appear that the general conclusions 

 stated by previous workers are in part inapplicable. The size of 

 the species appears to be in no way correlated with the occurrence 

 of a multiple testis. For example, our largest species, Crypto- 

 bronchus and Nccturus, have testes of the simple type; three spe- 

 cies of medium size Plcthodon glutinosus, Gyrinophilus porphy- 

 riticiis, and Amblystoma punctatum likewise have testes of unit 



i The writer is unable lo confirm the occurrence of a multiple testis in 

 Spelerpes, though about a dozen males of the species Spelerpes bislineattis 

 have been examined. McGregor ('99) likewise states that no division of the 

 testis into lobes occurs in Amphiuma. 



~ The multiple testes of the Ccecilians, judging from the descriptions 

 available, are probably of a type different from those of the Urodeles. Spengel 

 ('-6) describes the enlargements as being numerous in an immature animal, 

 and states that they are separated By regions from which germ cells are en- 

 tirely absent. Urodele males show no such primary growth centers ; neither 

 are germ cells entirely absent from any region of the testis. 



