^ 



GENERATIVE APPARATUS OF BIRDS. 1003 



various names— as horse-shoe, bilabial, semilunar, annular, and fringed hymen. When ruptured, 

 it retracts very much, but there always remain some vestiges of it, which are designated 

 carunculse myrtiformes. 



Vulva.— Thin presents a cavity and an orifice, as in the domesticated animals ; but the 

 cavity is not so deep, and is named the vestibule; it extends to the hymen or its debris. The 

 entrance to the vulva occur in the middle of a cuneiform prominence that is confounded, above, with 

 a kind of eminence— the mons Fe?iem— wliich appears to protect the pubic symphysis. It is 

 margined by two folds on each side : one cutaneous— the labia majora ; the other mucous— the 

 labia minora (or nymphse). The labia majora are convex externally, continuous above with 

 the mons Veneris, and unite below to form an acute angle, named the fourchette ; they are 

 covered externally with hair. The labia minora, more or less developed, leave the fourchette, 

 and extend around the entrance to the vagina, uniting above the clitoris, and forming the prepuce 

 of that organ. 



The clitoris is lodged in the superior commissure of the vulva ; its point is directed down- 

 wards, especially during erection ; its base is attaclied, on each side, to the two erectile lobes 

 which constitute the bulb of the vagina (bulbi vestibuli). 



Two racemose glands— the vulvo-vaginal, or glands of Bartholine—pout their secretion over 

 the walls of the vestibule. 



Marnrn^.— These are pectoral, and two in number. In their centre, they present an 

 enormous papilla— the 7iipple— into which the excretory canals open ; it is surrounded by a 

 brown circle, the areola of the nipple. 



CHAPTER III. 



Generative Apparatus of Birds. 



1. Male Generative Organs. 



The generative organs of the male are the testicles, and an excretory apparatus 

 much simpler than that of Mammals. 



Testicles. — These organs are placed in the sublumbar region of the abdominal 

 cavity, behind the lungs, and below the anterior extremity of the kidneys, in front 

 of the three last ribs. Their form is usually oval, and their volume varies with 

 the different species, as well as at different seasons ; at the breeding-season they 

 are greatly developed. 



E.ccretory afparatus. — In Birds there is not, properly speaking, an epididymis. 

 The vas deferens passes from within the posterior extremity of the testicle, 

 is directed in a flexuous manner backwards, draws near to the ureter on its own 

 side, going along the kidney with it, and arriving at the cloaca, where it termi- 

 nates by an orifice to be alluded to hereafter. In the Duck, it has near its 

 termination a small oval vesicle, always filled with spermatic fluid. 



Organ of copvlation. — This varies with the species. In the Gallinacge, it is 

 only a small papilla, placed below, near the margin of the cloacal opening, and 

 between the two orifices of the deferent canals. This papilla is traversed by a 

 furrow, through which the semen flows. 



In the Palmipedes, this organ is much more developed, and is peculiar. 

 Contained within a tubular cavity in the cloaca, it is protruded externally at the 

 moment of copulation by the eversion of this cavity, like the finger of a glove ; 

 it then appears as a long pendent appendage, twisted like a corkscrew. 



