10 



LIVING AND LIFELESS MATTER 



bacteria with the constant current entering the mouth. If it is 

 transferred to a sterile medium it gets little or no food and the 

 protoplasm begins to waste away. The first effect of this un- 

 compensated waste is the appearance of spaces or vacuoles, 

 and after some time in this skeleton-like condition the organism 

 dies (Fig. 2). In other cases the effect may be shown by a 



FIG. 2. FIG. 3. 



FIG. 2. Effect of starvation in Paramccium can-datum. Photographs (same 

 magnification) of normal (at right) and starved individuals. 



FIG. 3. Effects of starvation in Dileptus gigas. Photographs (same magnifi- 

 cation) of preparations of normal individual and individuals starved ten and 

 twenty-one days respectively. All sister cells. 



constantly diminishing size; Fig. 3 represents a normal speci- 

 men of the protozoon Dileptus gigas and sister organisms 

 starved for ten and twenty-one days. 



What happens in these small living things finds a rough anal- 

 ogy in a coal fire. The coal, made up of carbon and inorganic 

 matter, is rapidly oxidized, and energy in the form of light and 



