Royal Asiatic Society, 259 



are certainly true females, and that the reproductive bodies more 

 nearly resemble eggs than gemmae in their origin and development. 

 Hereafter, however, it may be convenient to give a separate name to 

 those egg-like bodies, which are fertile vsdthout impregnation, but for 

 the present they must be called eggs. 



The author then gives a list of the instances of Parthenogenesis 

 which, so far as he knows, are recorded among the Articulata. 

 Finally, he expresses the belief that the careful consideration of these 

 cases, and of the facts now recorded as to Daphnia, and the still more 

 wonderful observations recently detailed by Siebold in regard to Apis 

 (if these latter are confirmed), must surely remove all lingering doubts 

 as to the identity between eggs and buds ; and remarks, that if Prof. 

 Huxley's definition of "individual" and "zooid" is to be adopted, 

 it will be impossible to assert of any Daphnia or Moth, whether it is 

 the one or the other, and the Hive-bee will have to be considered as 

 an hermaphrodite, a species without male individuals. 



Under these circumstances, the author suggests that it would be 

 more convenient to continue, as heretofore, to call the individual of 

 any species that which is individualized, even though in this case the 

 individuals of one species will not always be homologous with those 

 of another. 



BOMBAY BRANCH OF THE ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY. 



November 13, 1856. — W. E. Frere, Esq., C.S., President, in the chair. 



" Transformation of the Vegetable Protoplasm into Actinophrys** 

 By H. J. Carter, Esq., Assistant Surgeon H.C,S. Bombay. 



The author stated, that when he first entered upon the study of 

 the Infusoria and freshwater Algse, he had no idea of any union 

 existing between the two, further than that of a gradual approxima- 

 tion of form and organization : and that he was opposed to any 

 sudden leaps from the animal into the vegetable kingdom or vice 

 versdy might be seen by the facts which he had brought forward, in 

 attempting to account for the transformation that takes place in the 

 CharacecB when the contents of their cells undergo the changes which 

 he had described on a previous occasion (Annals, vol. xvii. p. 101, 

 &c.). But latterly his opinions had altered, and he was now com- 

 pelled to view these transformations as a direct passage of the proto- 

 plasm into Monads. 



The process which ends in this development had been called 

 by Nageli "abnormal cell-formation,'* and Nageli thought that in 

 some instances germs were thus produced which propagated the 

 plant. Nor could Pringsheim come to any other conclusion than 

 that they were reproductive in Spirogyra, where he had more parti- 

 cularly observed them ; while the philosophic Alexander Braun, after 

 recapitulating all that had been made known on the subject in his 

 * Rejuvenescence in Nature,' adds, '* the future will certainly unfold 

 many interesting phsenomena in this hitherto little-worked field." 



Before detailing his observations on this development in Spiroyyra 



17* 



