PLANTS FEEL AND CAPTURE FOOD. 129 



any one may verify. If Actinise have been seen to fold 

 up their tentacles when a cloud has passed before the 

 sun, this has been a coincidence, not a causal relation ; 

 so far from light being the necessary condition of their 

 expansion, they are in perfect expansion in the dark- 

 ness ; and if the venturous naturalist will, with the 

 solemn chimes of midnight as accompaniment, take 

 his lantern on the rocks, he will find all the Ane- 

 mones in full 'blossom. I said that Rapp might still 

 be read with profit. Hear him on this point. " Many 

 Zoophytes, although without eyes, possess the power 

 of distinguishing light from darkness. This has long 

 been asserted of the Actiniae, nevertheless, on some 

 species, it appeared to me that neither light nor dark- 

 ness exercised any appreciable influence. Actinia 

 plumosa^ which I often watched on the western coast 

 of Norway, expanded its tentacles equally in the dark, 

 as when I removed it suddenly from darkness into 

 direct sunlight. The Actinia depressa suddenly 

 collapsed when direct sunlight was allowed to fall on 

 it." I have repeatedly tried the experiment of over- 

 shadowing the pool in which the Actiniae were expand- 

 ed, but never saw them retract their tentacles in 

 consequence. The reader will not suppose that I mean 

 to deny the sensitiveness of the Actiniae. I am merely 

 answering an argument which several writers have 

 repeated respecting the alarm felt by the Actinise when 

 a cloud veils the sun, or a shadow affects them. 



But the Anemone must be an animal, you suggest, 

 because it is seen to catch and swallow other animals. 



I 



