William Lundbeck : Some remarks on the eggs and egg-deposition of Halobates. 13 



or less strongly marked sculpture after the species. The sculpture is most strongly 

 marked on the ventral side and at the anterior end, and decreases towards the dorsal 

 side, where it almost or wholly disappears. Only one micropyle, situated in or very 

 near to the front pole ; it forms a canal, issuing from a funnei-shaped deepening in 

 the surface ; the canal runs somewhat tangentially in the chorion, and is rectangularly 

 bent, The females can bear a few eggs at the end of abdomen, but probaly only for 

 a rather short time. The egg-laying takes place on all objects possible floating on 

 the surface of the sea. One female produees about 25 eggs. In general several or 

 many females lay their eggs on the same object. It seems as if the eggs can also 

 be laid without being attached to any underlayer, so that they form a floating heap. 

 The eggs are apparently laid without any defmite order, or this is at any rate only 

 very insignificant ; this seems, however, partly caused by the circumstance that many 

 females lay their eggs together ; when groups of eggs that may be supposed to pro- 

 ceed from one female are examined, there often appears some arrangement in a few 

 transverse rows, following each other, and consisting of parallel eggs, all with their 

 front ends in the same direction. The eggs are always deposited with the dorsal 

 side against the substratum, the ventral side upwards ; they are fastened with a mass 

 which in general entirely envelops them, and which no doubt is gelatinous. The 

 opening of the egg-shell occurs through its splitting in the front end, down the 

 middle of the dorsal and ventral side, to a little beyond the middle, so that two 

 lateral valves are formed. The larvæ probably moult very soon after their escape 

 from the shell. 



