420 J. E. BLOMFIELD. 
separate the bundles from each other ; the adhesion decreases 
as age increases. 
The bundles of spermatozoa do not lie against the true 
wall of the testicular crypt; at all times there is to be made 
out quadrate or roughly spherical cells which represent the 
testicular epithelium, and more particularly is this the case 
if the testis be taken about the month of December, when 
the cells have begun to grow slightly and form a very dis- 
tinct epithelium between the bundles and crypt wall. (This 
is shown in fig. ].) Between these epithelial cells are others 
of a supporting nature, generally semilunar in shape and 
darkly stained, which are the interstitial cells. They are 
particularly well seen when the epithelium is looked down 
on in a section which has passed longitudinally along a 
crypt in the right plane, or in sections of the testis of a frog 
which is not yet sexually mature. Fig. la@ shows two of 
these cells from a young testis. v 
The next stage is to be found in the early summer after 
the spawning time is over, when the testis is empty of the 
bundles of the spermatozoa, and consequently rather shrunk 
in size. 
In a teased preparation of this stage are found a few un- 
broken bundles and many free spermatozoa; but besides these 
there are peculiar spindle-shaped or irregular cells, which have 
no definite nucleus, but what seems to be the remains of a 
broken up nucleus, viz. two, three, or more spherical stained 
spots, varying in size and in position. Frequently the 
surface of the cell is marked with striz in the longitudinal 
direction, and these are due, I believe, to the adhesion 
of the spermatozoa round this body, representing the 
blastophoral cell, which as they slide off elongate and mark 
the cell which supported them (figs. 9—21). 
Another very noticeable feature about these cells is the 
number of vacuoles. 
These cells are, I believe, the breaking down blastophoral 
corpuscles, which, after being drawn out by the sliding off of 
the bundles, and having served their purpose, are thrown off 
and undergo degeneration. 
In a section of the testis in the lumen of the crypt, inter- 
mingled with free spermatozoa and breaking up bundles, 
are seen the spindle-shaped cells just described, and on the 
periphery of the crypt the testicular epithelium, as seen in 
fig. 1,spp.,where it is beginning to undergo changes of growth ; 
cells are found with several nuclei, often eight, and in many 
places the epithelium does not consist of a single layer of 
cells but two, formed by the transverse division of a cell. 
