GOO 



CEPHALOPODA. 



- 298 - 



The form and arrangement of these bunches are no doubt dependent 

 upon the peculiar character of the terminal gland found in the oviduct 

 of the parent, whereby the last covering to the ova is furnished. 



(1604.) Cuvier remarks that the male Poulpes must be less nume- 

 rously met with than the female, as among the numerous specimens 

 dissected by him scarcely one-fifth were of the former sex. 



(1605.) The various parts of the male generative apparatus are re- 

 markably similar, both 

 in structure and arrange- 

 ment, to the correspond- 

 ing portions of the sexual 

 organs of the female. 

 The testicle strikingly 

 resembles the ovary both 

 in its outward form and 

 internal arrangement : 

 like that viscus, it con- 

 sists of a capacious mem- 

 branous sac (fig. 298, 6); 

 and on opening this 

 there is found, attached 

 to a small portion of its 

 inner surface, a large 

 bundle of branched ca3ca 

 (a), in which no doubt 

 the seminal fluid is ela- 

 borated. These strangely 

 disposed seminigerous 

 casca have apparently no 

 proper excretory ducts; 

 but the impregnating 

 fluid secreted by them 

 is, as it would seem, 

 poured into the general 

 cavity of the sac, exactly in the same manner as the ova in the other 

 sex, and, being allowed to escape from this reservoir through a wide 

 orifice (c), it enters the vas deferens. The canal last mentioned (d) is 

 long, slender, and very tortuous, but after many convolutions it enters 

 a wider canal (e), called by Cuvier vesicula seminalis, the interior of 

 which is divided by imperfect septa ; and, its texture being apparently 

 muscular, this part of the excretory apparatus may possibly, by its con- 

 tractions, expel the spermatic fluid from the body. On issuing from the 

 seminal vesicle, the semen passes the extremity of an oblong gland (/), 

 which Cuvier denominates the prostate : its structure is compact and 

 granular; and it seems to be destined to furnish some accessory fluid 



Generative organs of the male Cuttle-fish. 

 (After Cuvier.) 



