OF THE HUMAN BODY. 27 



the form of a tubercle, ami sometimes that of a 

 small cluster of i^-rapes, or entirely deudroid or ar- 

 borescent. If these ovaries are examined with a 

 microscope, they are seen to contain a prodigious 

 quantity of cggs,(84) of divers sizes and diflerent 

 contour or outline, and perfectly dark "when near 

 their period of maturity, (.35) 



The articulations of the taenia, in some instaii- 

 ces, are long or narrow, in others, short and broad ; 

 we sometimes see them almost square, slightly ilat- 

 tened, — these ovaries expel their eggs through the 

 perforated papillae observed on the lateral" parts, 

 and which, according to Block, communicate by 

 means of two canals with the ovaries. Certain 

 naturalists assure us that the seminal vessels open 

 near the ovaries, aud that the worm bedews the 

 ©va with the seminal fluid the instant it deposites 

 them. 



It has from this been concluded that these 

 worms are hermapiuodite, and this idea has been 

 the Fiiore readily adopted, because among these 

 worms the distinction of the two sex<is has never 

 been discovered. (S6) 



Block has often observed two of these eggs so 

 closely united that they seemed to be but one ; he 

 could not separate them till he had steeped them 

 sometime in tepid water.(87) This sagacious au- 

 thor has however remarked, that this adhesion of 

 these eggs, miglit arise from an abundance of vis- 

 cous humour. This observation is not therefore 

 sufficient to prove tlie existence of two sexes iu the 



