300 MR FRANK E. BEDDARD 



apertures of the spermathecse. The two male pores of each side of the body are very 

 much nearer to each other than the posterior of the two is to the oviducal pore. 



It follows, therefore, that, while the posterior of the two funnels is connected with a 

 vas deferens which opens upon the following segmeut, the anterior vas deferens traverses 

 two segments before it communicates with the exterior. This is the only instance known 

 to me of an Annelid which would obviously belong to Claparede's division of the Limicolce, 

 in which the aperture of the vas deferens is situated further behind its funnel than the 

 following segment ; and this genus forms an unique instance of the vasa deferentia of 

 each side opening on to the same segment, but by separate orifices. 



In the position of the funnel and male orifices this genus appears to be intermediate 

 between Phreoryctes, on the one hand, and JEisenia ( = Tetragonurus) on the other. In 

 Phreoryctes, each vas deferens opens separately on the segment behind that which con- 

 tains the funnel. In Pelodrilus, the anterior male pore has receded until it has come to 

 lie in the same segment with the posterior pore. In Eisenia — probably, we cannot say 

 certainly, for the worm has never been studied anatomically — both vasa deferentia open by 

 a common pore on segment XII. 



§ Ovaries. 



There are a single pair of ovaries (fig. 27, ov) in segment XII. Each is attached close 

 to one side of the ventral nerve cord. The ovary, as shown in fig. 41, a, is of an oval, some- 

 what pear-shaped form ; it is for the most part made up of small germinal cells, and con- 

 tains one or two ova in advanced stages of development. The ova, however, do not undergo 

 their entire development in the ovary ; masses of cells consisting of developing ova are 

 apparently from time to time broken off, and undergo their further development in the egg 

 sac. The fully mature ova (see fig. 41, a) are laden with yolk granules, and are of very 

 large size ; a single ovum will extend through two or three segments. I never observed 

 (in three specimens investigated by longitudinal sections) more than two or three mature 



ova in a given worm. 



§ Oviducts. 



The two oviducts open on to the intersegmental groove XII/XIII. One of these is illus- 

 trated in longitudinal section in fig. 40. What strikes one about the oviducts of this and 

 other " Limicolce " is the small size, as compared with the gigantic ova which have to find 

 their way out of the body cavity through them. The epithelium is of course ciliated — the 

 cilia being short ; the funnel is, as in the Lumbriculidse, " sessile " upon the ventral body 

 wall just in front of the septum separating segments XII and XIII. The duct is thus 

 reduced to the smallest dimensions. 



§ Spermathecce. 



Pelodrilus is furnished with a single pair of spermathecae in segment VIII. 



Each spermatheca opens close to the boundary line between segments VII and VIII, 

 at a spot corresponding to the male apertures, i.e., between the dorsal and ventral 

 setae, though nearer to the latter. 



