Agassiz on the Embryology of the Turtle. 349 
spring, enabling this species to lay annually from five to seven eggs, after 
"It has reached its eleventh year. 
“The question was then naturally suggested, whether fecundation is 
the result of the first act of copulation, or of the second, the third, or 
tot appear to be an instantaneous act, resulting from one successful con- 
hection of the sexes, as it is with most animals. The facts related above 
"OW, on the contrary, that, in Turtles, a repetition of the act, twice every 
Year, for four successive years, is necessary to determine the final develop- 
ment of a new individual, which may be accomplished in other animals 
by a single copulation. 
a 
than could be supposed at first; and notwithstanding the most diligent 
“arch, my efforts to trace the cee particles through the oviduct, as 
7 as . . 
Copulate in confinement; and those which I could catch in coitu in their 
hative haunts have only exhibited spermatic particles in the oviduct. I 
Ye not yet seen the first fact which could lead me to admit that the 
Permatic particles penetrate into the egg. I am therefore obliged to 
abstain from expressing any decided opinion upon the question of the 
been called mi dt 
micropyle, has always appeare 
_ aration of the ate which ‘ape is developed, and by no means to 
Pass through the vitelline sac. Without the most careful examination it 
NOt possible. to perceive how complicated the sac is, in which the egg 
