The general structure of the Molluscan intestine has not been sufficiently investigated to render any comparison of this structure of Patella with that of other Mollusca possible.
It corresponds to the right of the two primitive ctenidia in the untwisted archaic condition of the molluscan body, and does not project freely into the branchial cavity, but its axis is attached (by concrescence) to the mantle-skirt (roof of the branchial chamber).
As in other Molluscan groups, we find a wide variation in the early process of the formation of the first embryonic cells, and their arrangement as a diblastula, dependent on the greater or less amount of food-yolk which is present in the egg-cell when it commences its embryonic changes.
In the hinder part of the foot (not shown in any of the diagrams) is the opening of a large mucusforming gland very often found in the Molluscan foot.
Curiously enough, however, they differ from the cephalic Molluscan eye in the fact that, as in the vertebrate eye, the filaments of the optic nerve penetrate the retina, and are connected with the re surfaces of the nerve-end cells nearer the lens instead of with the opposite end.