ZOOLOGY. 321 



and chemical. The movements, the decomposing, the formative, the 

 analytical and synthetical power of the living matter, are due to the 

 operation of a power, or force, or energy, which is not to lie meas- 

 ured by the work achieved, nor to be, altered or converted into other 

 forms of force. It is a power that may be transmitted from particle 

 to particle, and that may cease its manifestation forever. How it 

 Originated we have not the slightest knowledge. We only know now 

 that it is always propagated from particle to particle, and that it can- 

 not be transferred to particles at a distance. Heat is but one of the 

 conditions under which this wonderful power manifests itself, not the 

 power itself. Contractility is a property of muscle ; contraction and 

 elasticity are properties of fibrin, just as hardness is a property of horn, 

 or nail, or bone, &c. ; but motion, increase, formation, as manifested in 

 germinal matter, are transmitted from particles of matter that possess 

 them lo particles of matter that do not. Muscle does not transmit its 

 contractile property, nor yellow elastic tissue its elasticity, to matter 

 which is void of these characteristics. Hence I distinguish the move- 

 ments of germinal or living matter from the movements of muscular 

 tissue ; and surely I may correctly term them vital movements until 

 some one proves that similar movements occur in matter which is 

 not alive. 



FACTS IN RELATION TO ENTOZOA ; DANGER OF USING SEWAGE 



AS A FERTILIZER. 



At the last meeting of the British Association, Dr. Cobbold pre- 

 sented in a popular manner the following important facts respecting 

 the diffusion and action of entozoa, which name has been applied to 

 certain minute intestinal worms. He said there was no doubt that 

 entozoa were introduced with vegetable food. They were more 

 likely to be taken from water-cress or other vegetables of the kind. 

 It was necessary with all vegetables that the greatest cleanliness 

 should be observed in preparing them for the table, and care should 

 be taken to avoid swallowing these small molluces, which were very 

 likely to escape observation. A great many diseases in children were, 

 he said, charged to eating unripe fruit, but, as far as entozoa was con- 

 cerned, that fear was entirely groundless ; and if they should be so 

 introduced, the chances were that the larvae would be taken from the 

 surface of the fruit. With regard to celery, cabbages, and all the 

 ordinary market-garden vegetables, he said that all decomposing ani- 

 mal and vegetable matter contained entozoa, and the more filthy the 

 water or liquid manure employed to secure the fertility of the garden, 

 the more likely was a supply of entozoa to be taken with the veget- 

 ables grown upon the land. Parasitic larvae might be found in water 

 that was to all appearance perfectly pure ; but, speaking generally, it 

 might be inferred that fresh spring water was perfectly innocuous. 

 Among the class introduced by water the smallest was -^ of an inch 

 long ; it carried 30,000 eggs, and went through marvellous transfor- 

 mations. There was another species taken from water, the habit of 

 which was to ensconce itself in the brain, causing death, which was 

 invariably set down as due to cerebral disease. The way in which it 

 reached the brain was from the coats of the stomach, through the cir- 

 culating medium. There was one kind inhabiting dogs, which was 



