124 JOURNAL OF COMPARATIVE NEUROLOGY. 
oids and cyprinoids), which also receives the typical gustatory 
fibers from the taste buds of the mouth. 
If now it can be shown that the terminal buds differ func- 
tionally, as well as in this thorough-going structural fashion, 
from all other cutaneous sense organs, then it would appear 
that their rank as a separate system of sense organs should re- 
main unchallenged. And _ such in fact is the attitude of most 
of the recent students of this question, even without a rigid de- 
monstration of the functional relations. I am, however, at this 
time in a position to contribute positive facts regarding the 
functions of the terminal buds, and since one recent author of 
note has within the year made a very forcible plea for a return 
to the older standpoint of Leypie and others that terminal buds 
and neuromasts are genetically related, I am moved to review 
the whole question again. 
But first we must examine more thoroughly the central 
nervous connections of the terminal buds, since the morphologi- 
cal argument really hinges upon this point. I repeat, that the 
terminal buds of the outer skin of fishes are known to be inner- 
vated by a-system of nerves which is enterely distinct throughout 
from either the tactile or lateralis nerves. There are no accu- 
rate observations which contradict this conclusion, while the 
positive evidence is quite decisive. The most convincing chap- 
ter in the elucidation of this problem is, I think, my own exam- 
ination of the innervation of the cutaneous organs in Ameiurus 
(Herrick, 01), which was undertaken primarily to test this very 
question. The cyprinoids would give an equally decisive an- 
swer to the problem, as I know from personal observation (as 
yet unpublished), though perhaps here the evidence would not 
be quite so easy to read. | 
The nerves from these terminal buds, no matter where 
they are located on the body, always reach the central nervous 
system through cither the X, LX or VII pairs of cranial nerves, 
and so far as my personal observation goes, practically all come 
in by the VII nerve, though all three of these nerves in all 
types receive gustatory fibers from taste buds within the mouth. 
Both of these classes of fibers, together with a large number of 
