SPAWNING. 27 



The spawning continued throughout my whole 

 stay, namely, till the middle of June, and I im- 

 agine that it lasts a still longer time. 



The spawning period thus begins, at any rate in 

 the case of the Amphioxus of Faro, somewhat earlier 

 than Kowalevsky stated. He observed in Naples oil 

 the 18th of May, for the first time, that the animals 

 which he kept in aquariums were liberating their 

 eggs. 



The spawning is, in a remarkable degree, dependent 

 upon the conditions of the weather and the time of 

 day. In cool and stormy weather, I had to wait for 

 weeks together for a spawning period, and without 

 result. But on warm sunny days, it was possible on 

 the second or third afternoon to distinguish in females 

 taken from the sand of the shore, masses of eggs 

 situated in the atrial cavity, and glistening through the 

 thin covering of the body. And then the animals 

 which had been placed in glasses began to emit their 

 sexual products through the opening of the mouth. 

 The males sent out whole clouds of sperma, and the 

 females in the same way their eggs in such quantities 

 that a great many remained hanging on their oral cirri. 



The sexual products probably made their way, 



