i8 



THEORIES OF THE CCELOM 



by Balfour, and was greatly strengthened by his observations on 

 the derivation of both notochord and mesoblastic somites from 

 archenteron in the Elasmobranchs, and by the publication in 1877 

 by Kowalewsky of his second paper on the development of 

 Amphioxus — in which the actual condition which I had supposed 

 to exist in the Vertebrata was shown to occur (see Figs. 6, 7, and 

 8), namely, the formation of the mesoblast as paired pouches in 

 which a narrow lumen exists, but is practically obliterated on the 



ih 



- mie 



Fl(i. 0. 



- Ui 



ih 



dk 



Fig. 7. 



Fig. 8. 



Figs. 6, 7, 8.— Transverse Sections of 

 THE Body of three Larvae of 

 Amphioxus at Successive Stages 

 OF development in order to show 

 THE Origin of the Ccelom as 



PAIRED EntEROCCELOUS POUCHES. 



Fio. 6 shows the ccelomic pouches 

 {Ih) as part of the enteric wall. 



Fig. 7 shows them nipped off as 

 closed sacs. 



Fio. S shows them pushing their 

 way between ectoderm and endodenn ; 

 the right-hand sac has divided into an 

 upper " niyoccel " and a lower " splanch- 

 iioco;!." aA-, ectoderm, ik, endodenn, 

 mfc, ?iilti, 7)1^2, epithelium of the cce- 

 lomic wall ; Ih, ccelom ; mp, foundation 

 of the nen-e cord ; ?i, nerve cord ; ch, 

 notochord ; tw, inyocal ; dh, gut. (After 

 Hatschek, ft-om Hertwig.) 



nipping off of the pouch from the archenteron, after which process 

 it opens out again as coelom. 



The chief difficulty which my theory of the uniform nature of 

 the coelom had to encounter was in bringing the cavities con- 

 sidered to be " cadom " in the Mollusca and the Arthropoda into 

 the scheme. At this time I accepted, in common with most embrvo- 

 logists, the view of Haeckcl and Gegenbaur, that the irregular 

 and more or less spongy space holding blood in those animals is 

 in reality the ccelom, and as a part of that interpretation I accepted 

 the theory that the blood-vascular system is itself only a part of 

 the coelom cut off from it and specialised in most cases, but con- 



