ANATOMY OF THE EARTHWORM. 265 
phagus ; it passes directly along the median line of the body, 
in close connection with the digestive tube, and, with its 
contractions and dilatations, the cesophagus also performs 
certain peristaltic movements, the object of which may be 
connected with the circulatory system. The large lateral 
vessels, described as hearts, are given off from the dorsal 
vessel in the region of the cesophagus, and the reproductive 
organs closely surround it; we have therefore in this region 
the most vascular and active part of the body. Although the 
cesophagus itself consists merely of a muscular and a mucous 
membrane, possessing no special secernary powers, yet the 
dorsal blood-vessel, throughout its connection with the 
cesophagus, is more or less invested with a yellowish-brown 
mass of cellular matter, which sometimes extends to the 
lateral vessels and hides the true walls of the blood-vessels 
from view. If a portion of this yellow mass be placed under 
the microscope with a high power, it will be found to consist 
of minute cells, the contents of which are still finer granular 
particles (fig. 13). They exactly resemble the cells which, 
in connection with the blood-vessels, invest the whole of 
the intestine, yet to be described, and which have always 
been considered as performing a secernary function similar 
to that of the liver. This yellow mass may therefore be re- 
garded as an organ of secretion in connection with the 
cesophagus, of similar nature to the hepatic membrane of the 
intestine. 
(sophageal glands.—Situated in the twelfth and thirteenth 
rings, and nearly or entirely concealed by the testicular 
masses, are three pairs of very remarkable glands, which 
have never yet been described. In fig. 5 the reproductive 
organs have been turned back, so as to expose these (#). The 
dorsal blood-vessel is in close connection with them, and 
two of the great lateral vessels lie in contact with their 
surfaces. Morren, indeed, in pl. xxxi of his memoir, 
gives a rough figure of two of these glands, but does not 
add any accurate description of them. Dr. Williams, in 
his paper in the ‘ Philosophical Transactions,’ describes a 
figure in his pl. vi as the reproductive organs of the 
earthworm, and denominates a certain mulberry-like mass 
“calciferous glands.” No description of these glands is 
given in his memoir, and the figure is so utterly unlike 
anything existing in the earthworm that I cannot say 
whether the esophageal glands are meant, although no other 
calciferous bodies are to be met with in Lumbricus. In 
fig. 4 the three pairs of cesophageal glands and part of the 
cesophagus are seen remoyed from the attached blood- 
