310 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



numerous or complex as in a normal male fish. A thick 

 sheet of peritoneum, loaded apparently with fat, connects 

 the two testes. On cutting open the ovaries there was 

 no perceptible lumen, except at the posterior end, 

 where the substance of ovaries and testes became con- 

 fluent. At this place the lumen of the ovary was 

 continuous with that of the proximal part of the testis. 



Cases of hermaphroditism in most teleosts, especially 

 in Gadoid fishes, are, of course, very rare. Nevertheless, 

 a fair number of hermaphrodites have been described. 

 The earlier literature is discussed, and the instances of 

 hermaphrodite codfish cited in the well-known paper by 

 Howes* on the " Hermaphrodite genitalia of a codfish," a 

 further instance as recorded by Ramsay Smith, t and O'ther 

 cases are recorded by Masterman,J who discusses the 

 cases recorded later than those in Howes' classical paper. 

 The specimens figured by Howes and Masterman were 

 apparently functional females. Whether or not ripe 

 spermatozoa were extruded by these fishes while alive is 

 difficult to say, but probably the male organs were 

 functionless. In Ramsay Smith's specimen (from a 

 haddock) the testes and ovaries were equally well 

 developed, but the former were relatively larger than in 

 Howes' specimen, where the testis formed a small rosette- 

 shaped structure at the extremity of the ovary. In 

 Masterman's specimens the testes were small and there 

 were a few ripe eggs in the mouth of the oviducts. These 

 fishes were, therefore, probably functional females. In 

 the specimen now before me we have what is probably a 

 functional male fish. The testes are well developed 

 and there is free communication between them and the 



* Journal Linnean Society, vol. 23, 1891. 



t Rept. Scottish Fishery Bd., vol. 9, p. 352 1891. 



Do. do. vol. 12, plates 3 and 4, and vol. 13, 



p. 297, 1893- 



