68 
LIFE, IN ITS LOWER FORMS. 
being a cylindrical column of flesh, with the free or upper 
extremity truncate, and surrounded by one or more circular 
series of tentacles. The interior is hollowed to form a 
stomach, which is closed inferiorly, and opens superiorly 
by a slit in the disk. This orifice is margined by two 
muscular lips, excessively extensile, dilatable, and variable 
in form. The space between the stomach and the outer 
walls of the body is occupied by a number of perpendicu- 
lar septa, or partitions of membrane, which are set in a 
radiating manner, dividing the whole into chambers. In 
these chambers are situated the ovaries, in the form of 
frilled bands, much convoluted and covered with cilia, 
the germs of which are developed in tho intcrscptal cham- 
bers, and find their way out through a duct which opens 
at one of the angles of the mouth. It is a pleasing sight, 
and one by no means uncommon, to see five, ten, or 
twenty young, of various sizes, but perfect in form, expelled 
from tho duct, and dispersed around, where they soon 
attach themselves and constitute a colony around their 
parent. 
While in the body of their mother, they occasionally 
find their way into the tentacles, as these organs are 
hollow, and communicate with the interseptal chambers. 
Sir John Dalyell, w ho had paid great ’attention to these 
animals, thought that this was their normal position. 
“ The embryos,” he says, “ appear first in the tentacula, 
from whence they can be withdrawn and transmitted to 
others by the parent, and are at last produced by the 
mouth. In the course of six years a specimen preserved 
by the author produced above two hundred and seventy- 
six young; some pale and like mere specks, with only 
