2^6 WHITMAN. [Vol. IV. 



4. ChcBtopods. 



a. The Tubificid^. — Spermatophores are of very general oc- 

 currence among the oligochsetous annelids. They were observed 

 in the seminal vesicles of the Tubificidas as long ago as 1828 by 

 Duges, and in 1850 by Budge; but their significance escaped 

 these older authors, and even as late as 1861-62 Claparede 

 described them as opalina-like parasites, under the name of 

 Pachydermon acuminatiitn and P. elongatum. It was not until 

 1869, in a joint work with Metschnikoff, that Claparede recog- 

 nized the real nature of his " opalinoid parasites." 



In 1848 Kolliker saw the spermatophore of Spio attached to 

 the surface of the worm, and supposed it to be a Gregarina. 

 The first to discover their meaning, according to Vejdovsky, 

 was Doyere (1854-55). 



In some of these spermatophores the tails of the inclosed 

 spermatozoa project through the wall of the capsule, giving it 

 the appearance of being clothed with vibratile cilia. Such 

 spermatophores, in motion, resemble living organisms so closely 

 as to deceive the trained eye, as the Pachydermon of Claparede 

 well illustrates. Sometimes, as in Psatnmoryctes, these vibratile 

 portions adhere in bundles on the neck of the capsule, giving it 

 the appearance of being armed with recurved hooks like the 

 proboscis of an Echinorhynchus. Vejdovsky himself first de- 

 scribed these as " Widerhaken," but corrected himself in his 

 later monograph. 



Among the earlier contributions to a more definite knowledge 

 of these structures are two papers by E. Ray Lankester,i and 

 one by Franz Vejdovsky.^ 



Lankester remarks on "The Structure and Origin of the 

 Spermatophores of Two Species of Tubifex" (pp. 180, 181, 187) 

 as follows : — 



"The very curious structure of these built-up masses of spermato- 

 phores, the fact that they are an example of a kind of organizatioti 

 elsewhere without parallel, — a secondary aggregation, not due to growth 

 as ordinarily presented by organized beings, but to accumulation of free 

 independently developed elements, — gives them a claim on our atten- 

 tion, as well as the facts that they have been misunderstood by the 



^ Quart. Journ. Mic. Sci., 1870 and 1871. 

 2 Zeitschr. f. w. Zool., XXVII, 1876. 



