NATURAL HISTORY. xcvii 



The organs of circulation, in the form of the systemic ventricle and of the spongy 

 vence cavce, resemble those of Sepioteulhis more than those of Sepio/a; the branchial 

 ventricles are proportionately larger than in any other Cephalopod. The vetia cava, 

 after its division, becomes dilated and cellular, but the cells are not produced out- 

 wardly into distinct pendulous follicles, the exterior of the vein presents simply a 

 folded or convoluted appearance. The branchial ventricles are of a transversely oblong 

 figure, four lines in length, and three in breadth : they have the small fleshy appen- 

 dages, as in Sepiola, Sepoteuthis, and other true decapods. The fleshy stem of the 

 branchia, through which the branchial artery passes is very broad. The branchial 

 vein dilates into a sinus or auricle, before terminating in the systemic ventricle. This 

 is of a cylindrical form, tapering at its lateral extremities where the blood enters, 

 and bent upwards at the right side to give off the greater aorta ; the lesser aorta comes 

 off from the middle of the opposite side of the ventricle. 



The larger aorta ascends with the cesophagus between the lobes of the liver, the 

 smaller one descends to supply the ovary principally. The specimen was a female, and 

 had been taken at the season of reproduction. The ovary occupied the lower half of 

 the dorsal aspect of the abdomen ; it was filled with numerous bodies, varying in 

 size from one line to six in the transverse diameter, and with as various figures, some 

 being spherical, others oval, some pyriform, and a few rendered angular by external 

 pressure, but all having their superfices more or less reticulated, as in Sepia, &c., in 

 consequence of the honeycombed glandular structure of their parietes. These bodies, 

 which are appended by delicate peduncles, of various length, to one point of the mem- 

 branous ovary, are commonly regarded as the ova,* but they are, in fact, the glandular 

 calyces, which secrete the true ova; the analogous parts in the Nautilus I have 

 termed capsula oviferce : they correspond to the Graafian follicles or ovisacs of the 

 Vertebrata. The ova in these ovisacs exhibited in Rossia various stages of develop- 

 ment indicative of an internal impregnation : many of the reticulate ovisacs were 

 collapsed, having discharged their ova ; nine of the ova so discharged, were situated 

 in the single oviduct. The ova which still remained within the capsules had the 

 smooth transparent cortical membrane perfectly formed, and differed from the ova in 

 the oviduct only in the tenuity of this membrane. The discharged ova measured five 

 lines in the long and four in the short diameters. The oviduct was wide, thin, and 

 membranous; it passed along the ventral aspect of the ovary and pericardium towards 

 the left side: its termination was thickened, and beset with transverse glandular 

 folds, as in Nautilus, and was situated immediately behind the two large superadded 



• See Grant on the Anatomy of Sepiola, in Zool. Trans. — vol. i., p. 84, pi. 11, fig. 12. 



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