362 MAKKKTAl'.LE BRITISH MAKIXK FISHKS 



The gestation of the Scorpeenidae does not appear to have been 

 completely investigated, but it has been found that in gravid specimens 

 of the Norway haddock the embryos are small and very numerous ; the 

 number in a single fish was estimated at fully a thousand. At a certain 

 stage \vhich has been described, the individual embryos were slender 

 and small, not quite inch in length. The yolk-sac was large in 

 proportion, and some embryos were enclosed in an egg-membrane, 

 while others had hatched. The embryos were situated in the spaces 

 between folds and processes of the germinal tissue of the ovary ; these 

 processes were highly vascular, and doubtless served for the respiration 

 of the embryos, that is to say, the latter derived from the blood in them 

 the oxygen necessary for their existence. 



