ANIMATED TRUMPETS, HATS, AND PURSES. 71 



consumption of as much food as possible. The food 

 in each pouch is seen to be surrounded by a clear 

 liquid, which the celebrated Grerman naturalist, 

 Ehrenberg, considered to be bile. Such a creature 

 may well be called Poly gastric. 



The quantity of decomposing matter consumed 

 by these and all the Infusoria must be very great, 

 and the purpose served by them in the general 

 economy of nature very important ; for, besides 

 acting as scavengers and keeping the waters com- 

 paratively pure, they "arrest the fugitive atoms" of 

 organic matter in their journey back to the mineral 

 kingdom, and bring them again into the realm of 

 food-forming material i.e., their own bodies, 

 which, by their amazing power of increase, furnish 

 the material of life -tissue to the higher and more 

 complex animal world. Thus man himself be- 

 comes indebted to these humble beings for the 

 abundance of his food-supplies. 



The Bursars, like the Stentors, are endowed 

 with a nucleus and contractile vesicle, and propagate 

 by self -division, and also by means of internal germs 

 or embryo. One very striking feature in the Bur- 

 wrinte is the extreme delicacy of their bodies, 



