[Illustration: FIG. 39.--THE BRAIN OF _Sphæroma serratum_. (After BELLONCI.)
_Ant. I._ and _Ant. II._, nerves to 1st and 2nd antennæ. _f.br.r._, terminal fibre-layer of retina; _Op. g. I._, first optic ganglion; _Op. g. II._, second optic ganglion; _O.n._, optic nerve-fibres forming an optic chiasma.]
In Branchipus and other primitive Crustacea, Berger also finds the same retinal layers, but is unable to distinguish in the brain the rest of the optic ganglion. Judging from Berger's description of Branchipus, and Bellonci's of Sphæroma, it would almost appear as though the cerebral part of the retina in the higher forms originated from two ganglionic enlargements, an external and internal enlargement, as Bellonci calls them. The external ganglion (_Op. g. I._, Fig. 39) may be called the ganglion of the retina, the cells of which form the nuclear layer of the higher forms, and the internal ganglion (_Op. g. II._, Fig. 39), from which the optic nerve-fibres to the brain arise, may therefore be called the ganglion of the optic nerve. Bellonci describes how in this latter ganglion cells are found very different to the small ones of the external ganglion or ganglion of the retina. So also in Branchipus, judging from the pictures of Berger, Claus, and from my own observations (_cf._ Fig. 46, in which the double nature of the retinal ganglion is indicated), the peripheral part of the optic ganglion--_i.e._ the retinal ganglion--may be spoken { 91}of as composed of two ganglia. The external of these is clearly the ganglion of the retina; its cells form the nuclear layer, the striking character of which, and close resemblance to the corresponding layer in vertebrates, is shown by Claus' picture, which I reproduce (Fig. 40). The internal ganglion with which the optic nerve is in connection contains large ganglion cells, which, together with smaller ones, form the ganglionic layer of Berger.
The most recent observations of the structure of the compound retina of the crustacean eye are those of Parker, who, by the use of the methylene blue method, and Golgi's method of staining, has been able to follow out the structure of the compound retina in the arthropod on the same lines as had already been done for the vertebrate. These two methods have led to the conclusion that the arthropod central nervous system and the vertebrate central nervous system are built up in the same manner--viz. by means of a series of ganglia connected together, each ganglion being composed of nerve-cells, nerve-fibres, and a fine reticulated substance called by Leydig in arthropods 'Punktsubstanz,' and known in vertebrates and in invertebrates at the present time as 'neuropil.' A further analysis resolves the whole system into a combination of groups of neurones, the cells and fibres of which form the cells and fibres of the ganglia, while their dendritic connections with the terminations of other neurones, together with the neuroglia-cells form the 'neuropil.' As is natural to expect, that part of the central nervous system which helps to form the compound retina is built up in the same manner as the rest of the central nervous system.