ASHFORD : ON THE DARTS OF BRITISH HELICID^.. 77 



and extreme brittleness of the point of the weapon, which, he 

 says, would give way at the slightest contact with the opponent's 

 tough skin. But is not slightest contact all that is necessary to 

 attain the end required? Besides, many, from Lister to the 

 present day, have observed the isolated weapon left hanging by 

 its point from the partially pierced skin. The unusual activity 

 displayed by a pair of Helices^ each striving, in a blind fashion, 

 to prick its friendly adversary with the little stiletto, is described 

 as something amazing. One writer terms the exercise " extra- 

 ordinary gymnastics." It is a veritable but harmless fencing 

 bout with eyes half-blindfolded, and rapier fastened to the 

 shoulder! No wonder the belligerents occasionally make a 

 random thrust, and pierce when they only mean to prick. In 

 consequence of the slight attachment of dart to tubercle and 

 annulus, the connection is often severed in the conflict. Some- 

 times the annulus comes away with the dart, sometimes it is left 

 in the sac free or in situ. A weapon separated in the strife 

 either falls to the ground, or remains hanging from the skin of 

 the wounded party, or becomes entangled in the body-slime of 

 its owner or his partner. In the Inst case a curious fate may 

 then befall it. During the pairing which follows its use the 

 dart may by accident come in contact with and adhere to the 

 exterior of the organs engaged, and ultimately be withdrawn 

 with them into the body of one of the couple. There it works 

 its way, base uppermost (for in any other position it would be 

 stopped at the entrance), either up the spermatheca duct, into 

 the branch of that duct, into the oviduct, or into the spermatheca 

 itself To understand this process, it is only necessary to call to 

 mind the child's amusement of putting an ear of barley, 

 inverted, into the coat-sleeve to find it at night at the shoulder 

 or down the back. It may progress — it cannot retreat. It thus 

 sometimes happens that two, or (more rarely) even three darts 

 are met with in the tubular organs of one animal. But this is 

 not all. It is not an uncommon circumstance (it has occurred 

 five times in my own experience) to find a dart lying free 



