378 EVENINGS AT THE MICROSCOPE. 



Now to examine such a collection, proceed as I am about 

 to show you. Hastily glancing with the pocket-lens over 

 the foliage, and selecting such filaments as seem the most 

 loaded with dirty floccose matter, I pluck off with pliers 

 one or two, together with one or two of the cleaner ones 

 that are higher up on the plant, nearer the growing point. 

 Having laid these on the lower glass of the live-box, I 

 take up with the tip of a fine tube, or a pipette, a minute 

 quantity of the water at the bottom, which flows in as you 

 see, carrying a few granules of the sediment. This drop I 

 discharge upon the glass of the live-box, put on the cover, 

 and place the whole on the stage of the microscope. 



First, let us use a low power, one hundred diameters 

 or so, in order to take a general glance at what we have 

 got. Here is an array of life, indeed ! Motion arrests 

 the eye everywhere. " The glittering swift and the flabby 

 slow" are alike here; clear crystal globules revolve giddily 

 on their axes ; tiny points leap hither and thither like 

 nimble fleas ; long forms are twisting to and fro ; busy 

 little creatures are regularly quartering the hunting- 

 ground, grubbing with an earnest devotedness amoncr the 

 sediment as they march up the stems; here are vases with 

 translucent bodies protruding from the mouths; here are 

 beauteous bells, set at the end of tall threads, ever 

 lengthening and shortening ; here are maelstroms in 

 miniature, and tempests in far less than a teapot ; rival 

 and conflicting currents are whirling round and round, 

 and making a series of concentric circles among the 

 granules. Surely here is material for our study. 



I see an object slowly creeping along the glass, which 

 will be just the thing for our purpose. It is the Proteus 

 {Amoeba diffluens)* Let me put on a higher power, and 

 submit it to your observation. 



* The names given to this little creature are expressive of its charac- 

 ter. Amoeba is from the Greek a/ictj3t) (amoibe), signifying change ; and 

 Proteus in mythology was an old prophet of the sea, who when seized 

 assumed all manner of forms to avoid uttering his predictions. 



