124 



THE INFLUENCE OF INANIMATE SUKROUNDINGS. 



thenogenesis were not exposed to the effect of cold, but kept in 

 a constant summer heat, and at the same time supplied with 

 suitable food, no males would occur, and the young would be 

 uninterruptedly produced by the parthenogenetic mode. In 

 fact Reaumur did succeed in this way in producing artificially 

 above fifty parthenogenetic generations in the course of three or 

 four years, all descended from one mother. The converse ex- 

 periment has never, so far as I know, been made namely, 

 whether it would be possible to produce males in the spring by 



FIG. 31. a, Diplozoon paradoxum, from the gill of a fresh- water fish ; 6, Polystomvm 

 integerrimum, from the bladder of a frog. 



artificially lowering the temperature, although they do not pro- 

 perly appear till later in the year, and thus to diminish the 

 normal number of successive parthenogenetic generations in a 

 summer. It is highly probable that it might succeed. 



The facts lately communicated by Zeller are no less interest- 

 ing. He found that certain parasites, in precise opposition to 

 the Aphides we have been speaking of, Diplozoon paradoxum 

 and Polystomum integerrimum (fig. 31), produce true eggs in 

 the summer only, which must be fertilised before they can 



