Mr. Robert Garner's Malacological Notes. 379 



posed to combine the matrix and album in iparous gland, called 

 testis by Cuvier. This double communication, with the im- 

 perfect separation of the vas deferens from the matrix [Helix) ^ 

 may effect the transference of both ova and spermatozoa to the 

 matrix in default of impregnation from without. Perhaps, 

 in the sluggish nature of the animals, and in their liability to 

 be isolated, we may see a reason for this arrangement ; and we 

 think that there is no longer much special mystery in their 

 generative economy. The vesicle is a reservoir or spermatheca, 

 as is the long comi)anion tube present in some Helices, and in 

 which post coitum the ligula is found also. This just men- 

 tioned ligula or chitinous strap, being a spermatophoTe or 

 carrier of the spermatozoa, is formed in the long appendix or 

 jiagellum attached to the male organ, whilst the dart (or two 

 darts, H. virgata), so curious in itself, and still more so from 

 the way in which it is used*, is formed by the fimbriated 

 glands at the base of the muscular sac, in which it is contained 

 when not in use. Other branchiate univalves [Onchidium) 

 have the same organ, but less developed. Equally curious 

 with the above, or more so, is the arrangement in respect of 

 this function in the Cephalopoda, though in some of them the 

 fertilizing material seems to be transmitted directly, through 

 the medium, however, of spermatophores (corpora Needhami), 

 tantamount perhaps to the curious spermatophores of Paludina 

 amongst Gastropods. It may be mentioned, as an instance 

 how much allied species may differ with respect to this func- 

 tion, that the genus Bythinia^ so near to Paludina^ has only the 

 ordinary spermatozoa. Endosmosis has a remarkable effect 

 on these last bodiesf. In some of the Cephalopoda one of the 

 arms is, as now well made out, transformed into the sperma- 

 tophore or hectocotylus^ becoming detached and left within the 

 mantle or sac of the female, and maintaining its position by 

 means of its suckers, the filiform extremity insinuating itself 

 into the orifice of the oviduct. In a small Loligo we think 

 we traced a duct leading from the male gland to the modified 

 arm or hectocotylusj ; and we have several times found the 



* It is commonly found in tlie recipient animal near tlie insertion of 

 the narrower or upper conjoined oviduct and vas deferens — that is, near the 

 termination of the companion tube of the vesicula. The author princi- 

 pally follows his own observations here as elsewhere, but may refer to two 

 excellent papers : — Saunders, Quart. Journ. Micr. Science, Oct. 1866 ; and 

 Newton, ib. Jan. 1868. 



t Report of Brit. Assoc. Aberdeen. 



X In some species the duct is seen to run up on the outside of the arm in a 

 superficial cutaneous fold ; in most species it is one of the right arms, 

 in a few one of the left, which is hectocotylized (Woodward). 



