A remarkable organ makes its appearance on the dorsal side of the oesophagus (the side opposite the adult ganglion) formed of an oval mass of cells attached to the epiblast at the apex of a small ciliated papilla (fig. 130 A and B, _x._). This organ will be spoken of as the dorsal organ. According to Hatschek it develops as a solid outgrowth of the hypoblastic walls of the mesenteron shortly before the mesenteron joins the oesophagus (fig. 129 B, _x._). The cells composing it arrange themselves as a sack, which acquires an external opening on the dorsal surface (fig. 130 A, _x._). In a later stage the lumen of the sack disappears, but at the junction of the organ with the epiblast a pit is formed, lined with ciliated cells, which is capable of being protruded as a papilla. The organ itself becomes invested by a lining of cells, which Hatschek regards as mesoblastic. A nearly similar organ to this is found in the embryo of Loxosoma [Vogt (No. 302) and Barrois (No. 298)]. Here however it is double, and forms a kind of disc connected with two eye spots. Hatschek has made with reference to the dorsal organ the extremely plausible suggestion that it is a rudimentary bud, and that the hypoblastic sack it contains gives rise to the hypoblast of the young polype developed from the bud. Although, owing to the deficiency of our observations on the attachment of the larva, this suggestion has not received direct confirmation, yet the relations of dorsal organs in Pedicellina and Loxosoma respectively strongly confirm Hatschek's view of their nature. Both of these forms increase in the adult state by budding: in Pedicellina there is a single row of buds formed successively on the dorsal side of the stem, corresponding with the single dorsal organ of the embryo; while in Loxosoma a double row of buds, right and left, is formed, in correspondence with the double nature of the dorsal organ. As to the mode of attachment of the embryo next to nothing is known, the few observations we have being due to Barrois. From these observations it would appear probable that the larva, as is usual amongst Polyzoa, does not become directly converted into the permanent form, but that, on becoming fixed, it undergoes a metamorphosis in the course of which its organs atrophy. I would venture to suggest that the whole free-swimming larva atrophies, while the dorsal organ alone develops into the fixed form[121]. [121] My view of the metamorphosis which takes place during the fixation of the larva involves the supposition that in Loxosoma, about the attachment of which we know absolutely nothing, two buds are directly formed in accordance with the double nature of the dorsal organ.