322 SEA-SIDE STUDIES. 



Quatrefages and Siebold object to the name of Par- 

 thenogenesis as embodying an error. The larval Aphis, 

 says the former, cannot properly be styled a virgin, 

 because it is an incomplete organism, and "a Tidee de 

 virginite se rattache invinciblement celle de la possi- 

 bilite de cessation de cet etat." He objects, therefore, 

 to the name, because, he says, Owen's conception rests 

 on the remarkable exception of the Aphis-larva, in 

 which reproductive organs, incomplete, but still per- 

 fectly recognisable, have been discovered. The ob- 

 jection, which was never very forcible, is completely 

 silenced by Von Siebold's discovery of perfect insects, 

 male and female, in the virgin-progeny of bee and 

 moth. As to Von Siebold's objection to the name, that 

 by it Owen " confounds Parthenogenesis with alterna- 

 tion of generations,"' it is met not only by the explana- 

 tion Owen o'ives in a note to the translation of Von Sie- 

 hold's work (p. 11), but is further met by w^hat will pro- 

 bablv be seen, in the followino- discussion, to be the true 

 state of the case ; namely, that the generation of bees 

 and moths is essentially the same as that of Ascidians, 

 Aphides, and Pol3rpes ; and instead of confounding two 

 distinct things in one phrase, Owen has reconciled two 

 seeming differences. 



Eetaining, therefore, the name Owen has given to 

 the phenomenon, let us examine his theory. Quatre- 

 fages, among objections of little weight, urges one of 

 more value when he says that the process of segment- 

 ation in the yolk is now known to be different from 

 that stated by Owen, being the spontaneous act of the 



