FECUNDATION. 311 



rus may draw into the neck an alkaline mucus previously 

 ejaculated, and with it a certain amount of seminal fluid, the 

 fact that conception may take place without orgasm on the 

 part of the female, and even without complete penetration 

 of the male organ, shows that the action we have described 

 is not absolutely essential, and that the semen may find its 

 way into the uterus in some other way, which it is certainly 

 very difficult to explain. 



Course of the Spermatozoids through the Female Generative 



Passages. 



The Spermatozoids, once within the cervix uteri, and in 

 contact with the alkaline mucus, which increases the activity 

 of their movements, may pass through the uterus, into the 

 Fallopian tubes, and even to the surface of the ovaries. Pre- 

 cisely how their passage is effected, it is impossible to say. 

 We can only attribute it to the movements of the sperma- 

 tozoids themselves, to capillary action, and to a possible pe- 

 ristaltic action of the muscular structures, and must acknowl- 

 edge that these points have as yet been incapable of positive 

 demonstration. 



In a very interesting memoir by Lott, which contains nu- 

 merous observations bearing on the mechanism of conception, 

 'the experiments upon the behavior of the Spermatozoids un- 

 der the microscope, in the presence of currents observed in 

 the liquid between the two plates of glass, develop some very 

 curious points. It was shown, in these experiments, that mo- 

 tionless Spermatozoids followed the currents freely ; that when 

 the current in any part of the field was strong, the moving 

 Spermatozoids were carried along with it ; but that when 

 the current was comparatively feeble, Spermatozoids endowed 

 with active movements made their way, as it were, against 

 it. 1 In reflecting upon these observations, it has seemed to 

 us that they offered an explanation, to a certain extent, of the 



1 LOTT, Zur Anatomie und Physiologic des Cervix Uteri, Erlangen, 1872, S. 

 139. 



