THE MALE EEL. 639 



Hohnbaum-Hornschuch presented in a dissertation published in 1842 — a paper which should be 

 rightly considered as of great importance in the literature of this question. The questions 

 concerning the ovaries of the Eel may be regarded as having been brought to a distinct con- 

 clusion by Eathke, who, in the year 1850, published an article describing a gravid female 

 Eel, the first and only gravid specimen which had, up to that time, come into the hands of an 

 investigator.' 



Discovery of the male Eel by Syeski. — The history of the search for the female of the 

 Eel having been given, for the most part, in a translation of the work of Dr. Jacoby, it seems ap- 

 propriate to quote the same author concerning the search for the male Eel, which, though much 

 shorter, is none the less interesting. 



In the dissertation of Hohnbaum-Hornschuch, published in 1842, the opinion was expressed 

 that certain cells found by the author in the ovaries, which differed from the egg cells by their form 

 and contents, should be regarded as the spermary cells of the Eel, and that the Eel should be 

 regarded as hermaphrodite. Six years later Bchltiser presented an interesting dissertation upon 

 the sexes of Lampreys and Eels in which he pronounced these opinions of Hohnbaum-Hornschuch 

 to be erroneous, and expressed the opinion that the male Bel must be extremely rare, or that it 

 was different, perhaps, from the female. Prom this time up to the beginning of 1870, a male Eel 

 was never seen, nor do we find any opinions expressed concerning the form of the male of the Eel 

 or its reproductive organs.^ 



According to Eobin, in 1846 George Louis Duvernoy (Olivier, Anatomic compar(§e, 6d. 2, 1848, 

 tome viii, p. 117) described the ruffle-tube type of the testis of the Lampreys and Eels, with the 

 free margin festooned in lobules, shorter to the right than to the left, like the ovaries, etc. He 

 added : "At the breeding season we perceive in it an innumerable quantity of granulations, or 

 small spermatic capsules, the rounded form of which has often led to their being confounded with 

 the ovules, at least in the Eels, in which, in reality, these capsules are nearly of the same size 

 as the ovules, but the latter are distinguished by their oval form." The ovules are spherical, and 

 not oval; but the other facts are fundamentally correct. It is also in error that Duvernoy adds 

 (p. 133): "The Eels and the Lampreys have no deferent canal, any more than an oviduct. Like 

 the ova, the semen ruptures the capsules in which it has collected and diffuses itself in the abdom- 

 inal cavity, whence it is expelled in the same way as in the ova." 



By some droll coincidence the University of Bologna, and soon after that of Pavia, were 

 again prominent participants in the eel tournament. At the meeting of the Bologna Academy, 

 December 28, 1871, Prof. G. B. Ercolani read a paper upon the perfect hermaphroditism in the 

 Eel.3 



Fourteen days later Prof. Balsamo Orivelli and L. Maggi read a detailed and elaborate paper 

 upon the "true organs of generation in Eels." These investigators, without concerted action, had 

 all at once brought up the celebrated issue of the previous century ; this time, however, having 

 specially in view the male organs of the Eel. All were convinced that they had reached a 

 final result by their investigations. The results were certainly very peculiar. In the paper of 

 Ercolani it was claimed that the snake-like folds of fat, which had formerly been noticed near the 

 ovarium, were nothing else than the spermaries of the Eel, and that upon the left side of the animal 



' Jacoby. Der Pisohfang in der Lagans von Comaccliio. Berlin, 1880, pp. 23-30. 



!> Robin, Comptes rendus, 1881, p. 383. 



'Jacoby states that in a paper by Eathke, published in 1838 in the Arehiv fur Naturgesohichte, he remarked: "I 

 expect soon to be able to say something concerning the male organs of the Eel." It would be very interesting to 

 know whether in the papers left by this skillful investigator there may not have been recorded some valuable obser- 

 vations concerning the male Eel. 



