344 SEA-SIDE STUDIES. 



On bringing tliem home, we place our captives in 

 glass vases, and begin to study them. The Nocti- 

 luccB are little crystal balls of about the size of a pin's 

 head, which, under the microscope, present the ap- 

 pearance figured in the Frontispiece (fig. 3). The 

 transparence of its structure permits an easy inves- 

 tio-ation. Not a fibre is to be seen, unless, vrith de 

 Blainville, we consider the transverse markings of the 

 tail in the light of muscular fibres, a supposition 

 which is very questionable. In the neighbourhood of 

 this tail there is usually a mass of food, or the indi- 

 gestible remains of food. Not that we are to look for 

 a stomach in this animal — nothing of the kind exists ; 

 but in lieu thereof we find, as in Infusoria, a number 

 of vacuolcB, or assimilating cavities, which appear and 

 disappear, according to need, formed out of the con- 

 tractile substance which is seen radiating in filaments 

 all throuo-h the substance of the animal, and which 

 M. Quatrefages* likens to the sarcode described by 

 Dujardin. In this curious animal, not a trace has 

 been discovered of vessels, nerves, senses, or indeed of 

 any " organs " whatever. It is a mass of animated jelly, 

 with a mobile tail. Its mode of reproduction has been 

 variously expounded, but the observations of Quatrefages 

 and Krohn seem placed beyond a doubt by those re- 

 corded in Mr Brightwell's paper, f proving that they 

 multiply by spontaneous subdivision. No one has yet 

 observed anything like reproduction by means of ova. 



* Annates des Sciences Nat. 1850, p. 231, 



+ Microscopical Journal, No. XX. 1857, p. 185. 



