Spiral Structure of Muscle. 93 



sarcolemma. Such future spirals in a far later stage are seen in 

 fig. 21 ; and fig. 22, a, b, c, shows the way in which the cell- 

 germs perpetuate themselves by division and subdivision, every 

 spiral having within its Avinds the elements of reproduction, 

 fig. 23 ; and the primitive fasciculus being often found to have 

 preserved cell-germs for a more general purpose in a central 

 line, fig. 21. The reproduction of muscle, when fully formed, 

 is probably no other than a continuation of its history of deve- 

 lopment, and has been already illustrated in fig. 6. By self- 

 division of its hyaline axis of cell-germs, every fibril may become 

 converted into a primitive fasciculus. 



The laws of development in general are best studied in the 

 ovum ; and he who holds the wondrovis process of cell-formation 

 in the germinal vesicle, i. e. the history of development of the 

 germinal spot described by the author in the Philosophical Trans- 

 actions for 1840 as undesendng of particular attention, may 

 spare himself the trouble of inquiring into the history of deve- 

 lopment of muscle, or that of any other tissue, as his labour 

 would be thrown away. In that development of the germinal 

 spot, the hyaline in the centre of the spot is obviously the prime 

 mover. It is the hyaline in the centre of the germinal spot that 

 is the substance undergoing fecundation ; and no doubt it is the 

 hyaline seen in the head-like extremity of the spermatozoon that 

 is the real fecundating substance. (The author once saw, and 

 figm-ed in the Philosophical Transactions for 1840, what ap- 

 peared to him to be a spermatozoon in the very act of entering 

 the ovum of the rabbit ; its head having already penetrated an 

 orifice discernible for a time in the zona pellucida*.) In the 



* He mentions having repeatedly found unaltered spermatozoa in the 

 interior of ihe ovum in its next stages, after it had passed into the Fallo- 

 pian tube ; and having had the opportuuit}' of showing them to Professor 

 Owen, who declared himself fully convinced of the presence of the sperma- 

 tozoa within the ovum. Once the author counted as many as seven in a 

 single ovum. (A dra\ving of that ovum will be found in a paper by him 

 "On Fissiparous Generation," in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, 

 October 1843.) In all instances the spermatozoa were motionless; and 

 not among the cells in which the development of the essential substance 

 was i)roceeding, but in the colourless fluid between those cells and in the 

 zona pellucida. [While passing through London in May 1862, the author 

 learns that after the lapse of many years these observations have been in 

 two quarters confirmed by others; Dr. Nelson having presented to the 

 Royal Society a paper announcing the jiresence of spermatozoa in the in- 

 terior of the ovum of a creature at the other end of the animal kingdom, 

 Ascaris mi/slax; and Mr. Newport having added a postscript to a paper of 

 his on the ovum of the frog, also presented to the Royal Society, in which 

 he candidly acknowledges having erred when, in a former memoir, he (pies- 

 tioned the accuracy of the discovery made by the author of the present 

 paper, that entire si)ermatozoa do actually make their way into the interior 

 of the ovum.] 



