40 THE SPERMATOZOIDS. 



presented by the granules of which the spermatozoid was formed.* Mr. 

 Gulliver f has recently had the opportunity of examining these sperma- 

 tozoa, and declares that he could detect neither mouth, arms, nor internal 

 vesicles. The dark spot seen in the body of the spermatic filaments of 

 some mammalia, and compared by some writers to a sucker, is believed 

 by Henle,J to be caused merely by a slight concavity similar to that on 

 either side of the human blood-drill. Several observers have noticed 

 that in many of the spermatozoids of the human subject there is, at the 

 junction of the body with the caudal filament, a gelatinous mass or mem- 

 branous appendage. This appearance, as well as the little prominences 

 on the body and knots on the caudal filament, which are sometimes seen, 

 is probably due to their mode of development, and, at all events, is no 

 evidence of independent animal organization. 



3. The rate of the motion of the spermatic filaments has been measured 

 by Henle,|| and found equal to 1 inch in 7J minutes. The force of the 

 motion was observed by the same physiologist, to be sufficient, easily to 

 displace crystals of calcareous salts, ten times as large as the bodies of the 

 spermatozoids. The body of the spermatozoid presents no movements, no 

 contractions or dilatations. The caudal filament alone is the seat of 

 motion, and it continues to move when separated from the body. As to 

 the character of the movements, Kolliker insists ^f that their uniformity 

 distinguishes them from the movements of infucory animalcules, which 

 can vary their movements at will, or in accordance with their perception 

 of external objects. On the other hand, the difference between the 

 movements of the spermatic filaments and cilia, is not greater, he says, 

 than would be expected to result from the one being fixed and the other 

 altogether free. 



One phenomenon which must be mentioned here, is the tendency of 

 the spermatozoids to attach themselves to foreign bodies, such as flocculi of 

 fibrin, or epithelium-scales.** 



4. Wagner has corrected his statement, that strychnine and other 

 narcotics instantaneously arrest the movements of sperm atozoids.jf Solu- 



* Appearances due to the same cause probably led Berres to imagine he saw a granular 

 fluctuating mass, a canal filled with coloured matter, and a round vesicle, which might be a 

 stomach or an ovary, in the spermatozoid of the human subject. Oesterreich. Mediz. Jahr- 

 bucher, 1843, p. 141. 



t Transactions of Zoological Society, February, 1846. 



J Allgemeine Anatomic, p. 950. 



Dujardin, Henle, Dairy mple, Pouchet, and Wagner. The last-named physiologist 

 thinks the appearance at the root of the tail is the eifect of commencing decomposition. 



II Allgem. Anat. p. 954. f Op. Cit. p. 66 and p. 80. 



** Henle, Kolliker. 



tt The same observation has again been made by Prevost, and been advanced by him as 

 an argument in favour of the opinion that the spermatozoids are independent animals. 

 (L'lnstitut, No. 465.) 



