Contributions to a Knowledge of South African Oligochaeta — Part II. 247 
Eemarks. 
The two most interesting features of the new form concern the position 
of the spermathecal apertures and the pecuhar penial structure. 
It is interesting to note that if what we have suggested in discussing 
the relation of the penis in P. africanus to the atrial sac of P. beddardi be 
correct, both forms have the spermathecal pores dorsally situated. 
There can be little doubt that the ventral position of the independent 
pores in most species of Phreodrilus represents the more primitive con- 
dition. In all the other genera the spermathecae are either absent or 
functionless on the one hand, or communicate with the exterior indirectly 
by way of the male or female genital ducts. 
In the latter case the ducts pass upwards towards the dorsal side before 
entering the male or female ducts. 
It is in this relation that the dorsal disposition of the anterior terminal 
portions of the spermathecal ducts is interesting, since it is so clearly 
intermediate between what obtains in most species of Phreodrilus on the 
one hand and all other genera on the other. 
In a recent paper dealing with the genus Gondwanaedrilus we pointed 
out the existence of a chamber which is an elongation backwards of the 
penial chamber and the correspondent of the " autospermatheca " of 
Phreodriloides. This chamber was apparently then evolved before the 
loss of the spermathecae in Phreodriloides, since the spermathecae are still 
present in Gondwanaedrilus. Before concluding this we considered the 
suggestion that the spermathecal structures in Gondwanaedrilus might be 
comparable with the peculiar structures of that name as found in 
Eudrilidae, and not with the more typically Oligochaetan structures as. 
found in Phreodrilus. 
This idea w^e did not support since the anterior part, at least, of the 
spermathecal chambers showed a well-developed cellular structure of a 
different nature to that found in coelomic sacs, although the epithelium 
was of a loose nature. We receive support in this conclusion from the- 
dorsal disposition of the pores, etc., in P. beddardi and P. africanus. 
The new form undoubtedly finds its nearest alhes in P. beddardi and 
P. subterraneus — both New Zealand forms ; and this distribution may yet. 
prove of great significance. 
