214 THE GEMMULES. 



fested independent action. These bodies, (germs I 

 may surely call them) are somewhat pear-shaped (Fig. 

 8) with a little tubercle at the larger end, around which 

 are set a few (about four or five) long cilia or setse, 

 twice or thrice as long as the body. These are not 

 used for vibratile action, but as oars slowly waved 

 through the water, or apparently to push withal, when 

 the gemmule is making good its exit. When this is 

 effected, it proceeds only a short distance ; the waving 

 motion then becomes more feeble, and presently 

 ceases. Under stronger pressure a larger mass was 

 forced out, consisting mostly of germs immature, in 

 wliich the cilia appeared as a broad thin band stretch- 

 ing out from the neck forwards, but without any 

 motion. I could distinctly trace the course of these 

 germs through the pellucid body, and found that 

 they proceeded from a large opaque mass, lying across 

 the cavity, between the buccal funnel and the large 

 intestinal sac ; and they appeared to issue by the 

 same orifice as that which gave exit to the contents 

 of the intestine. I hence infer, that like other animals 

 whose adult character is to be fixed to a changeless 

 base, the young of this species are endowed for a brief 

 period with the faculty of locomotion, sufiicient to 

 enable them to transport themselves to a site more or 

 less remote from the parent, where then each fixes 

 itself and becomes the founder of a colony. 



The motions of this zoophyte are lively and ener- 

 getic; and hence we may infer the existence of a 

 well-developed system of muscles. The body is 

 occasionally tossed to and fro by the forcible bending 

 of the foot-stalk ; this latter is in some degree capable 



