102 American Fisheries Society 



There is another matter pertaining to these trout of 

 more fish cultural importance than what I have previously 

 said, which I wish to submit for your consideration. 

 Some ninety years ago a distinguished anatomist and em- 

 bryologist by the name of Rathke described the ovaries 

 of various fishes and amongst these were the Salmonoid 

 fishes, concerning which he mentions that while the Sal- 

 monoids have no oviduct and the ovaries are suspended 

 free without any covering in the abdominal cavity, there 

 extends back behind each ovary a narrow flat band which 

 commonly arises at the upper and posterior end of the 

 plate-like ovary, gradually diminishes in width backward, 

 and finally becomes lost towards the end of the abdomi- 

 nal cavity. In the salmon proper, he states, it disappears 

 upon the air bladder, opposite the commencement of the 

 last fifth of the abdominal cavity, in the fresh water trout 

 on the side of the intestine not far from the anus, and 

 in the Coregoni on the intestine close to its end. In all 

 these fishes, he says, the central abdominal cavity must 

 take the place of an oviduct, as it receives the eggs when 

 they are detached and allows them to make their exit by 

 a single opening at its posterior extremity. 



In the smelt, however, which is a salmonoid fish, he 

 says that there passes from each ovary a band, one end 

 of which is attached to the dorsal, the other to the ab- 

 dominal wall, so that, in each lateral half of the abdomi- 

 nal cavity, there is a chamber which receives the eggs 

 when they are detached from the ovary; that the two 

 chambers ultimately unite above the anus; and in fact, 

 close in front of the place where, in other fishes, the 

 oviduct is situated. 



In 1883, Huxley studied the smelt and reviewed 

 Rathke's paper, confirming the statements Rathke made, 

 but in the case of the smelt going a little farther. Hux- 

 ley showed that in this fish there were oviducts formed 

 in this way: Each ovary has the form of a half-oval 

 plate, with the curved edge ventral and the straight edge 

 dorsal. The latter is suspended by a narrow mesoarial 

 fold of peritoneum from that part of the dorsal wall of 



