THE POISON OF THE MURRY 



feel a sharp pain on the body; we touch, look at the 

 wounded spot. Only the redness, the stinging sensation 

 tell us what has happened. A jelly-fish has passed, 

 touched us, stung us with its batteries. We did not 

 see it, but it touched us and left its mark. 



What are we to think about these different kinds 

 of organization, which are found in so many different 

 places, in such varying forms ? The case from which 

 we started out, that of the murry, has developed to an 

 unforeseen degree. By considering it together with 

 similar cases, the first idea we formed has both changed 

 and extended. Starting as a specialized and particular 

 phenomenon, it has become a general phenomenon, 

 which one feels has a connection with the elementary 

 conditions, still more general, of living beings as a whole. 

 The particular function becomes a single one of the 

 modes of a complete system of action, on which it de- 

 pends, whence it takes its origin, and in which it loses 

 itself as it is accomplished. When we speak of poisonous 

 animals, we bring to mind, more or less distinctly, the 

 most categorical and best known example, the venomous 

 snake. We are inclined to judge the others by its 

 standard, or at least to make comparisons with it. In 

 the viper we find a mechanism carried to the highest 

 pitch of organic perfection, with a definitely localized 

 gland in which the toxic liquid is produced, and a 

 tooth provided with tubes running through it which 

 take the poison straight to the bottom of the wound 

 which it causes. Therefore, without being able to 

 confirm the truth of this idea, we conclude that the 

 organ is indeed made for the function it has to fulfil; 

 that both organ and function agree in the most com- 

 plete manner; and that the whole forms a dangerous 

 weapon, expressly designed to serve both for attack and 

 defence, and that it has no other purpose. 



But the case of the murry compels us to be less 

 categorical. Its bite, like that of a snake, is poisonous, 

 but the area in which the poison is produced is diffused 



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