THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 23 1 



combined with what has been already alluded to in 

 Chapter XV, and in addition to other facts previously 

 known, tends to show that the transition from the 

 Amceba to the Monad, or the reverse, may be paralleled 

 by a similar interchangeability between the form and 

 mode of growth of an Ama^ba and that peculiar to 

 a Fungus — so that either form may at times result 

 from one and the same living matter when it under- 

 goes internal modifications, with or without being sub- 

 jected to new conditions. This position is still further 

 strengthened by the facts which I have now to record. 



A few days after having made the infusion, the 

 changes in which have just been described, I prepared 

 another with a portion of the same sample of hay. 

 This second infusion, however, was made with water 

 at a temperature of i58°F, which was maintained at 

 this heat for two hours. After filtration it was 

 placed in a similar vessel, and allowed to stand side 

 by side with the other infusion. On the third day, 

 embryonal areas of various shapes and sizes were seen 

 in the firm pellicle which had formed upon the surface 1. 



on one or two occasions seen small Monads tolerably abundant in 

 infusions of hay which had only been prepared twenty-four hours, and 

 in which no coherent pellicle had yet formed in which they could have 

 arisen by the secondary process. Moreover, they have been found in 

 sealed flasks in which no pellicle was present^ even by M. Pasteur. In 

 my own Experiment b (vol. i. p. 443), the Monads must have had this 

 primary mode of origin. Here some of the new-born specks of living 

 matter seemed to have grown into Fungus-germs, some into minute 

 Amoebae, and others into Monads. 



^ The daily temperature being about 60° F. 



