162 SEA-SIDE STUDIES. 



near the base, about the centre, and close to the disc, they 

 may be found : nor are they on every septum ; sometimes 

 we may make three or four incisions before detecting 

 them. 



Such are the ovaries of the Crassicornis : but are they 

 entitled to the name ? Are they organs at all ? A minute 

 inspection of them will confirm what I said just now that 

 they are not " organs," properly so called ; that is to say, tliey 

 are not, like the ovaries of higher animals, permanent organs 

 having a definite and specific structure ; they are, in truth, 

 nothing but accumulations of germ-cells in a delicate mem- 

 brane. They have none of the essential characteristics of an 

 ovary. It is true that Spix, Delle Chiaje, Eapp, de Blain- 

 ville. Van der Hoeven, and others, describe what they call 

 oviducts, without, however, agreeing as to their disposition. 

 But ]\Ir Teale and M. HoUard have been unable to find them, 

 and I also can confidently assert that no duct whatever, nor 

 anything distantly resembling it, exists ; but, as I have 

 convinced myself by scores of dissections, the whole structure 

 of the ovary is limited to a delicate membranous stroma, in 

 which the ova are imbedded. When the ova are matured, 

 it is most probable that this stroma bursts to set them free, 

 and they fall into the general cavity, where their further 

 development takes place. It would be justly considered an 

 unwarrantable laxity in scientific langTiage if the temporaiy 

 accumulation of germ-cells beneath the investing membrane 

 of the Hydra were designated as an ovary ; and no less un- 

 warrantabk' i.s it to call a somewhat similar accumulation of 

 geiTU-cells in the Actinia, an ovary. Tlie pretended " organ " 



