214 



then enters upon a calculation, from which, however, no definite 

 results are deduced. 



June 17, 1852. 



The EARL OF ROSSE, President, in the Chair. 



The following gentlemen were admitted : — 



Rev. Jonathan Cape. John Tyndall, Esq. 



John Mercer, Esq. 



The following gentlemen were recommended by the Council for 

 election as Foreign Members ; — 



Adolphe Theodore Brongniart. | J. Lament. 

 Benjamin Peirce. | V. Regnault. 



1. On the Impregnation of the Ovum in the Amphibia (Second 

 Series revised), and on the direct agency of the Spermatozoon." By 

 George Newport, F.R.S., F.L.S. &c. Received June 17, 1852. 



The author remarks that, having in a former paper shown that the 

 spermatozoon alone is the impregnatory agent, he endeavoured in a 

 subsequent communication to the Royal Society, a report of which 

 is printed in the Proceedings for June 1851, to arrive at some con- 

 clusion as to the nature of its influence ; and, from the facts he was 

 then acquainted with, he announced the view that the spermatozoon 

 appeared to be the organ of a special form or condition of force in 

 the animal body. At that time he had no evidence that the sperma- 

 tozoon penetrates into the coverings of the egg, as he had constantly 

 found it attached only to the surface. Since then he has detected 

 it within the substance of these coverings, and sometimes even par- 

 tially imbedded in the vitelline membrane beneath them ; but he has 

 no evidence that it enters the vitelline cavity. While therefore the 

 fact of penetration into the envelopes necessitates some revision of 

 the details of the view announced, he still regards the spermatozoon 

 as the organ of a special condition or form of force in the animal 

 structure. 



He then proceeds to show the relative duration of vitality in the 

 spermatozoon and the egg, and points out that that of the former 

 is shorter than is usually supposed ; that at the temperature of 

 55° Fahr. it usually is lost in from three to four hours after removal 

 from the body into water ; but that at a lower temperature it is 

 retained longer, and that when the spermatic fluid has contained 

 many undeveloped cells, and has been preserved in a temperature of 

 51° Fahr., it has fertilized at the end of twenty-four hours. The egg 

 loses its fitness to be impregnated very soon after it is passed into 

 water, usually within the first hour, owing chiefly to the endosmosis 

 and expansion of its envelopes. But when retained within the body of 



