I described these bodies in two states. An earlier one, in which the two cones were separated by an irregular row of deeply stained granules; and a later one in which a furrow had already appeared dividing the cones as well as the cell. In neither of these conditions could I see any signs of the body vanishing completely. It was as clearly defined and as deeply stained as an ordinary nucleus, and in its later condition the signs of the streaming out of material from its pointed extremities were less marked than in the earlier stage.
All these facts, to my mind, point to the view that these cone-like bodies do not disappear, but form the basis for the new nuclei. Possibly the body visible in each cone in the later stage, was the commencement of this new nucleus. Götte[94] has figured structures somewhat similar to these bodies, but I hardly understand either his figure or his account sufficiently clearly to be able to pronounce upon the identity of the two. In case they are identical, Götte gives a very different explanation of them from my own[95].
A second of my results, which points to a series of intermediate steps between division and solution of the nucleus, is the distribution in time of the peculiar cone-like bodies. These are present in fair abundance at an early period of segmentation, when there are but few nuclei either in the blastoderm or the yolk. But at later periods, when there are both more nuclei, especially in the yolk, and they are also increasing in numbers more rapidly than before, no bodies of this kind are to be seen. This fact becomes the more striking from the lobate appearance of the later nuclei of the yolk, an appearance which exactly suits the hypothesis of the rapid budding off of fresh nuclei.
The observations of R. Hertwig[96] on the gemmation of Podophrya gemmipara, support my interpretation of the knobbed condition of the nuclei. Hertwig finds (p. 47) that
The horse-shoe shaped nucleus grows out into numerous anastomosing projections. Over the free ends of the projections little knobs appear on the surface of the body, into which the lengthening ends of the processes of the nucleus grow up. Here they bend themselves into a horse-shoe form. The newly-formed nucleus then separates from the original nucleus, and afterwards the bud containing it from the body.
From the peculiar arrangement of the net-work of lines of the yolk around these knobbed nuclei, it is reasonable to conclude that interchange of material between the protoplasm of the yolk and the nuclei is still taking place, even during the later periods.
These facts about the distribution in time of the cone-like bodies afford a strong presumptive evidence of a change in the manner of nuclear increase.
The last argument I propose urging on this head is derived from the bodies (Pl. 6, fig. 8a, b, c) which I have described as intermediate between the true cone-like bodies and typical nuclei. They appear to afford evidence of less and less of the matter of the nucleus streaming out into the yolk and of a large proportion of it becoming divided.
The conclusion to be derived from all these facts is that for Elasmobranchii in the earlier stages of segmentation, and during the formation of fresh segments, a partial solution of the old nucleus takes place, but all its constituents serve for the reconstruction of the fresh nuclei.
In later periods of development a still smaller part of the nucleus becomes dissolved, and the rest divides; but the two fresh nuclei are still derived from the two sources. After the close of segmentation the fresh nuclei are formed by a simple division of the older ones.