ORGANS OF CAMPANULARIA GENICULATA. 61 



hitherto been recognized. Neither Loven nor Van Beneden 

 in their numerous researches on the Cavipanularioi have seen 

 them, any more than the older observers. But in Steenstrup's 

 ' Researches on the Hermaphroditismns,' * I find a short 

 notice with respect to them. He says, " In the genera Tuhu- 

 larice, Eudendrium, and Campanularia;, I have always found 

 the ' nurse'-polypes to present only one sex ; and in Campanu- 

 laria (jeniculata. semen was never formed except in precisely 

 those individuals which were developed under the same con- 

 ditions as the true females which furnish the oua." 



Krohnf and Kolliker:{: have given some notices with respect 

 to male organs in other Sertularina. The former observed 

 spermatic capsules, corresponding to the ovicells in position 

 and figure, although growing upon separate stems, in Peiinaria 

 Cavolini, Eudendrium racemosum, and Plumularia cristata ; 

 and the latter also in Sertularia ahietina. Precise descriptions 

 and figures of these organs, however, are wanting ; antl with 

 regard to the development of the spermatozoids, Kolliker 

 merely mentions that they appear to be produced from elon- 

 gating vesicles, and figures them accordingly as they exist in 

 Sertularia ahietina. 



As I have had abundant opportunity of observing Camjmnu- 

 laria geniculata^ I directed my attention at once to the re- 

 productive organs and the propagative function, and was 

 fortunate enough, in the autumn of 1849, to detect the male 

 reproductive organs so long sought for in vain ; and the accu- 

 rate description and representation of which I consider to be the 

 more justified, since the development of the spermatozoids 

 also affords wholly peculiar and hitherto unknown relations. 



The microscopic examination of the axillary capsules, almost 

 always found upon the polypidoms of Campaiiularics, besides 

 the ovi-capsules so well figured by Loven, will occasionally 

 disclose the existence of capsules, containing, not ova but dis- 

 tinct round globular bodies, of about the same size as tlie ova, 

 though filled with a homogeneous granular substance, which 

 when more minutely examined, after the rupture of the cap- 

 sules, proves to be constituted of spermatozoids in very various 

 stages of development. 



These male capsules, as I shall term them in contradistinction 

 to the female capsules containing ova, are indistinguishable 

 from the latter by the naked eye either in size, form, or posi- 

 tion. Like those they always spring from the angle, where a 

 polype branches off from the main stem. Their length when 



* German translation by Hornschuch, pp. 66, 67. 



t MuUer's Archiv., 1843, p. 174. 



X Neuen Schweizerischen Denkschriften. Band viii. 



