DEVELOPMENT OF TBE CALIFOKNIAN HAG-FISH. 271 



trast Plate's fig. 3); they are typically flower-shaped, their 

 broadly everted petal-like margins enabling them to interlock. 



Time and Mode of Oviposition. 



Both Ayers and Price have agreed that in the Bay of 

 Monterey the spawning season of Bdellostoma is an extended 

 one. These conclusions agree fully with the writer's observa- 

 tions. He has obtained embryos of many ages from the same 

 locality at the same time ; he notes, however, that during the 

 present season the embryos were most abundant of a particular 

 size, a fact which suggests that a time of maximum spawning 

 had occurred. As to actual oviposition, the following note is 

 suggestive : — A fisherman brought in (August 25th) twenty- 

 three eggs, which he said had been spawned in the boat 

 shortly after the mother, which he also brought, had been 

 taken. Each egg was encased in a transparent glistening 

 outer capsule, delicate but elastic. One would be inclined to 

 believe that the fisherman had observed the normal method of 

 spawning, i. e. that the eggs were discharged at the same time, 

 extruded from the abdom.inal pores the more readily on account 

 of the sheatiiing capsule. The rupture of the capsule at or 

 before fertilisation would set free the fastening processes, and 

 thus enable the eggs to become attached, either together or to 

 other eggs in the neighbourhood. This view, as opposed to 

 that of Ayers, is supported by the fact that in a number of 

 cases embryos of widely different ages have been found in the 

 same egg-string. 



General Mode of Development. 



The material collected by the present writer includes an 

 almost complete series of embryos from a stage in which the 

 blastopore is closing, to one about the time of hatching; 

 together with these are several possible stages of segmenta- 

 tion. A few of the most typical of these embryos are shown 

 in the accompanying figures (figs. 3 — 8), and afford a con- 

 venient basis for an outline of the mode of Myxinoid develop- 

 ment. 



VOL. 40, PAET 2. NEW BEE. D 



