331 



Nachdruck verboten. 



Oll the efferent Ducts of the Testis in Chimaera monstrosa. 



By Prof. W. N. Parker, Ph. D., and T. H. Burlend, M. A., B. Sc, 

 University College, Cardiff. 



With 4 Figures. 



Within the last few years additions to our knowledge of the 

 anatomy of the urinogenital organs in the Holocephali have been made 

 by Mazza 1) and by Redeke 2), but neither of these observers was able 

 to satisfactorily elucidate the problem, left unsolved by Leydig and 

 Htrtl, as to the manner in which the sperms reached the spermiduct 

 from the testis. In 1851 Leydig ^) described and figured a series of 

 fine ducts arising from the testicular vesicles and uniting to form a 

 smaller number of anastomosing "vasa etferentia", which pass through 

 the peritoneal fold extending between the testis and "epididymis" (Neben- 

 hoden) or anterior coiled portion of the spermiduct; but he was 

 apparently unable to follow their further course. Hyrtl^), in 1853, 

 gave an account of these anastomosing canals, which he described as 

 opening into a space between the two lamellae of the mesorchium, 

 but he could not definitely determine whether this space communicated 

 with the epididymis, or whether it was merely a lymph-sinus: he, 

 however, inclined to Leydig's view, that the canals were true efierent 

 ducts of the testis. The manner in which the epididymis is bent 

 backwards, so as to rest on "Leydig's gland" (= non-renal portion 

 of the mesonephros), is referred to, but Hyrtl could not recognise 

 any connexion between the vasa efi"erentia and epididymis. 



In Callorhynchus, vasa efferentia are described by Parker and 



1) Atti d. Soc. di Sei. nat. e geogr., 1895, and Atti Soc. Ligustrica, 

 1895. 



2) Urogenitaalsyst. der Selachiers en Holocephalen. Acad. Proefschr. 

 Amsterdam, 1898; and Tijdschr. d. Nederl. Dierkund. Vereeniging. 1899. 



3) Zur Anatomie und Histologie der Chimaera monstrosa. Müller's 

 Arch., 1851. 



4) Ueber weibliche Oviducte bei männlichen Chimären und eine 

 männliche Vesicula seminalis bei Weibchen. Sitzungsber. d. K, Akad. 

 d. Wissenschaften, 1853. 



