OEGANS OP EEPEODUCTION. 209 



In Machilis the generative organs also open between 

 the eighth and ninth segment, but the ovary, instead of 

 being a simple tube, gives off, on its inner side, seven 

 short egg-tubes, which he above the intestine. These 

 latter, therefore, are fourteen in number ; and in the 

 beginning of September, when I examined them, each 

 tube generally contained towards its lower end three 

 egg-germs, in which a considerable deposition of yelk 

 had taken place ; and towards its free extremity from 

 fifteen to twenty egg-germs in earher stages of forma- 

 tion. 



The egg-tube is lined with epithelial cells, generally 

 from y^th to x^^th of an inch in diameter. Their 

 nuclei are about 2 5^0 of ti of an inch in diameter, and 

 very faint. Often, indeed, they can scarcely be per- 

 ceived ; but, generally, when the tube had been lying 

 some time in syrup, they became tolerably plain. At 

 the free end of the egg-tube are some apparently solid 

 nuclei, about as large as those of the epithelial cells, 

 and only differing from them in being more distinct, 

 and possessing granular contents. 



These nuclei are generally all about the same size ; 

 sometimes, however, one or two are larger than usual ; 

 and as this was the case in the first specimen I ex- 

 amined, I was inclined to believe that the nuclei in- 

 creased in size, and thus became the Purkinjean vessels. 

 As I was not able in other specimens, however, to find 

 any nuclei in the process of becoming Purkinjean 

 vessels, this view requires confirmation, though it is 

 supported by the analogy of other animals. 



Although in an unaltered condition the epithelial 

 cells of the egg-tube are very faint, and often alto- 

 gether invisible, yet if pure water be added and the 

 syrup be removed, the cell- walls and the epithelial 

 nuclei gradually become quite plain. Most of the cells 

 are, from the apposition of their neighbours, irregular 

 and somewhat angular in shape ; here and there, how- 

 ever, we see one quite round, and these can scarcely 

 be distinguished from the youngest Purkinjean vesi- 



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