PERIPATUS CERAMENSIS. 739 
thin membrane (fig. 5, m.); a pair of fine trachez run along 
the edges of this membrane and enter the ovaries. A single 
short median duct leads from the ovarian chamber and imme- 
diately divides into two oviducts (fig. 5, ovd.). At the end of 
each oviduct is a small globular receptaculum seminis opening 
into the oviduct by two short ducts (fig. 5, r.s. and d.) ; 
beyond these the tubes increase in size to form the large 
uteri (fig. 4, wt.). 
In very young specimens these organs are coiled up in the 
central body cavity behind the seventeenth or eighteenth 
pair of legs, the ovaries are attached by a short membrane to 
the septum, and the tubes are of equal diameter throughout. 
As they develop the membrane lengthens, and the ovaries 
and receptacula seminis are carried forward to about the 
fourteenth or fifteenth pair of legs, the uteri continue on till 
about the tenth or eleventh and then bend back and proceed 
to the subterminal vagina, increasing. in size from the recep- 
taculum seminis backwards. 
The eggs are very minute, about ‘05 mm. in diameter ; 
after passing the receptaculum seminis they begin to swell 
and divide, and embryos in various stages of development are 
found in the uteri, the one nearest the vagina in one uterus 
being slightly more developed than the corresponding one in 
the other uterus. The young are born one at a time, appa- 
rently alternately from each uterus, at intervals of about a 
couple of weeks; most likely births take place the whole 
year round. The largest specimen we took was about 55 mm. ; 
the young when born are about 13 or 14 mm. 
The sixty-three specimens examined were all females, so 
the male remains still to be discovered. That the male ot 
such a lethargic animal should be so rare is very strange. 
Many of the small individuals had embryos in their uteri 
showing that they had been fertilised; three half-grown 
specimens had their genital organs still small and packed 
away behind the seventeenth pair of legs and evidently had 
not been fertilised ; in these three specimens the slime ducts 
were enormously distended. 
