558 NOTES ON AUSTRALIAN EARTHWORMS, 



xviii. The testes are smooth white bodies, which superiorly are 

 drawn out into digitate processes tapering to fine points. The 

 posterior testes are attached partly to the ventral wall, and partly 

 to the posterior face of the mesentery between xi and xn. The 

 anterior ones, the basal portions of which lie just behind the 

 posterior spermatheca?, are attached partly to the ventral wall, 

 and partly to the anterior face of the mesentery between ix and 

 x ; they are smaller and further apart than are those of the 

 posterior pair. The anterior portions of the vasa deferentia are 

 very much plicated. The prostates are flattened, almost com- 

 pletely divided transversely into two portions. The prostatic 

 ducts are no doubt joined by the vasa deferentia, as is usual, 

 but in none of the specimens dissected by me have I been able 

 to see the actual connection ; the common genital duct is ex- 

 cessively short. 



The female organs comprise a pair of ovaries in the usual 

 position in segment xiii ; a pair of oviducts commencing in the 

 same segment by ciliated funnels and opening on the ventral 

 surface of the succeeding segment ; and three pairs of somewhat 

 rounded or pyriform sperm athecre, a pair in each of segments vn 

 to ix, and of which the posterior pair are sometimes the larger. 

 Each spermatheca has a small pyriform caecum placed anteriorly 

 and inferiorly, so as to be quite hidden until the spermatheca is 

 turned back. The spermatheca^ appear to be only very shortly 

 pedunculated, but the ducts are really longer than at first sight 

 appears, as they run for some distance in the body wall, and open 

 to the exterior two segments behind those which contain the 

 spermathecse to which they belong. 



The vascular system presents a supra-intestinal trunk which 

 throughout its course is more or less completely double, the two 

 constituent portions being confluent at, and for a short distance 

 on either side of each of the septa, and which in segments vn to 

 xiii is connected with the supra-nervian trunk by pairs of hearts, 

 of which the last three or four pairs are especially large. Some 

 of the "hearts" arise in part from a secondary longitudinal 



