494 General Notes. [ August, 
ing on the window-sill or gliding like a sunbeam along the back of a 
chair ; and some are so tame that they permit themselves to be stroked 
with a straw. — Henry GILLMAN, Waldo, Florida. 
SUPPOSED DEVELOPMENT OF PICKEREL WITHOUT FECUNDATION, — 
March 15, 1875. The boys brought in some brook pickerel. One was 
swollen with spawn, weight of fish 521 grains; of spawn freed from 
membrane, 127 grains, 117 spawn weighed 5 grains. Therefore whole 
number about 2972. 
This spawn was amber colored, and the eggs were in general translu- 
cent. Occasionally an egg could be seen which was slightly smaller 
than the rest, and clouded, and some few were opaque. These eggs, 
thus marked, presented different appearances under the microscope. I 
haye mislaid the notes and drawings that I took at the time, but can fur- 
nish the following facts from memory. The clouded eggs showed a differ- 
ent development from the others, there being a greater difference in size 
of the cells, and occasionally the cells arranged in lines. Some of the 
opaque eggs had evidently developed in the line of the fecundated egg, 
as the cells were arranged in the form of a curled fish, the line of the 
back being well defined, the line of the belly and sac poorly or not at all 
defined, while there was a concentration of cells about the locality of the 
eye. I cannot say that I saw a young fish, for I did not, but I saw what 
I considered sufficient to interpret as development to a certain degree, 
without fecundation. 
I was so much surprised, that for a time I doubted my own eyesight, 
and called my brother to look. He saw what he called a young fish in 
the egg, and so I was convinced, but I had not the courage to send my 
observations to men of science. 
This next spring I will try and procure some fresh specimens, and if 
my observations can be verified, as I doubt not but that they can be, I 
will send them to you. 
I should not consider this memorandum worthy of being forwarded to 
you, were it not for the encouragement of your letter, and I am fully 
as aware that such incompleteness can be of little value to science. Yet 
I am somewhat familiar with the microscope, and have studied the ovary 
of young calves, both in a fresh and injected state, and have had sufficient 
experience to eliminate imagination from my results, and recognize facts. 
I thereforé have confidence that I saw what I have so imperfectly out- 
lined, and I hesitate to ask others to believe, on account of their wonder- 
ful nature, that there can be such a development without fecundation in 4 
vertebrate. — E. Lewis STURTEVANT, South Framingham, Mass., July 
8, 1877. (Communicated by the Smithsonian Institution.) 
