HAG-FISHES. 
1207 
burgh Anatomical Museum (possibly the same specimen 
as formerly described by Thomson). Nansen also states 
that he observed in the Museum of Bergen a ripe egg 
which had been dredged up by I). C. Danielssen at 
Molde. In July, 1888, while examining a large num- 
ber of Glutinous Hags from Gullmar Fjord, I found in 
an individual 30 cm. long, containing 12 large eggs, a 
ripe egg furnished with threads at the ends (G. Retzius, 
Biol. Foren. Forhand., Bd. 1, Okt. 1888). This egg 
was still attached in the mesovarium, the third from 
behind in the chain of ripening ova. It was larger 
than the others, measuring 14 mm., had a yellower 
colour, was blunter at the ends, and harder on the 
ripe as those described by Steenstrup and the other 
above-mentioned writers. Since that occasion I have 
opened and examined several thousand Glutinous Hags, 
but I never succeeded in finding another egg so far 
advanced in development. 
On the 1st of January last (1895), however, Baron 
Axel Klinckowstrom (Ofvers. K. Vet. Akad. FOrh. 1895, 
No. 1) found, in a Glutinous Hag taken together with a 
o 
number of others in Gullmar Fjord by Fisherman Aback 
a day or two before, an egg at about the same stage 
of development as that described by me. This egg, 
which was of a bright reddish yellow, almost orange- 
coloured, lay entirely free in the abdominal cavity and 
Fig. 363. A Glutinous Hag, nat. size, seen obliquely from below and from the left. Abdominal cavity cut open to show its contents. 
a , lobes of the so-called mesorchium (male organ); b, a large, nearly ripe egg with thick, horny shell and horny appendages at both ends, 
of which the anterior was still attached to the mesovarium; c, less ripe eggs in the mesovarium; d , liver; e, /, intestinal canal; g, apertures 
of the foremost muciferous glands of the skin; h, apertures of the hindmost group of muciferous glands; i, cloacal aperture; h , outer branchial 
apertures; l, nasal aperture; in, oral aperture. 
surface, which evidently consisted of a strong, horny 
shell. The ends were each furnished with a horny 
process 4 mm. long, which proved to consist of a bunch 
of dense threads, all of them tipped with a button - 
shaped thickening armed with four barbs. One (the 
anterior) of these processes was attached to the con- 
nective tissue of the mesovarium; otherwise the egg 
hung free in the abdominal cavity. Fig. 363 repre- 
sents this specimen of Myxine with the abdominal ca- 
vity cut open and the ripened egg (b) suspended from 
the mesovarium. Probably this egg was not quite so 
dropped out on the latter being opened. Its total length 
was 20‘5 mm., the egg itself measuring 16 mm., and 
the two terminal bunches of barbed threads respectively 
3 and 1’5 mm. This find is of special interest as con- 
firming the opinion that the spawning of the Glutinous 
Hag is not restricted to an}- particular season. 
This is in effect our whole knowledge of this 
question. Manifold endeavours have been made during 
the last two decennia by several investigators (W. Muller, 
Cunningham, Nansen, myself, Tiieel, Tullberg, Klinc- 
kowstrom) to trace the development of the Glutinous Hag; 
Scandinavian Fishes. 
152 
