HERMAPHRODITISM. y 5 



for on a priori physiological grounds, it is, as Simon remarks, more 

 readily intelligible that a female should produce sperms than that a 

 male should produce ova. In this connection it is interesting to 

 notice how Brock, in regard to the development of the reproductive 

 organs of snails, maintains that they are laid down and developed on 

 the female type, and only become secondarily hermaphrodite. Purely 

 female forms still occasionally occur, which he interprets as exaggera- 

 tions of the side normally preponderant. So in hermaphrodite bony 

 fishes, the same author has shown that the preponderance is distinctly 

 female. 



Hermaphroditism is associated in some cases (for example, Polyzod) 

 with the occurrence of parthenogenesis in allied forms; and it 

 may be noted, as will become clear afterwards, that for a female to 

 become hermaphrodite is a sort of step toward parthenogenesis. It 

 means that certain cells of the reproductive organs are able to divide 

 of themselves, — to form, however, not an embryo, but a bundle of 

 sperms. 



The general conclusion, then, is that hermaphroditism is the 

 primitive condition, and that the cases now existing either indicate 

 persistence or reversion. 



