HISTOLOGY AND DEVELOPMENT OP MYRIOTHELA PHRYGIA. 535 



forming the apex of the spadix, are long^ narrow, and columnar 

 in character ; and their protoplasm is filled with numerous 

 small vacuoles, the contents of which become precipitated by- 

 preserving reagents, thus conferring a characteristically turbid 

 character on the entire cell. That end of the cell which abuts 

 on the basement membrane separating the endoderm of the 

 spadix from the developing generative elements is excavated 

 to form a vacuole. If we examine the cells which form the 

 villi we find that they have fundamentally the same structure, 

 except that the basal vacuole is now so much elongated that 

 we may almost speak of that portion of the cell as being 

 canalised (fig. 23). In other words, the whole spadix is a 

 specialised structure for the absorption of nutriment from the 

 somatic fluid of the blastostyle, which nutriment is doubtless 

 largely derived from the stored material of the vacuolate cells, 

 through the help of the somatic fluid. 



The absorbed nutriment, probably after it has undergone 

 important changes at the hands of the cells of the spadix, is 

 discharged into the vacuoles at their base which abut on the 

 supporting lamella, whence it passes to supply the remarkably 

 abundant fluid present in the entocodon of the female gono- 

 phore. 



These diff'erent points — (I) the general distribution of the 

 nutritive spheres, (2) the method of the discharge of those 

 bodies, and (3) the fact that the gonophore possesses an organ, 

 the spadix, the histological characters of which lead us to 

 suppose that it is designed to absorb nutriment from the 

 somatic fluid (which, especially in the autumn, when Myrio- 

 thela appears to exist largely at the expense of its stored 

 material, and probably throughout the year, must be largely 

 recruited from the reserve material of the vacuolate endoderm- 

 cells) — although when taken singly they are of slight value, 

 yet when considered together and as mutually supporting 

 one another they justify the statement that the metabolic 

 activities of the difl'erent parts of the endoderm are brought 

 into relation with one another through the agency of the 

 somatic fluid. 



