31 



end of the club-sliaped " zoo-sporangium" bursts, and these 

 "zoo-spores" pass rapidly out into the surrounding water, 

 each as a pear-shaped mass of protoplasm, rapidly moving 

 by means of two cilia at the end. 



After a short time — often within 10 to 15 minutes — this 

 active "zoos2:)ore" becomes quiescent, loses its cilia, rounds 

 off into a sphere, and develops a delicate membrane : it 

 remains thus resting for some hours. It then opens by a 

 minute pore, and its protoplasmic contents pass out again 

 as a "zoospore" — but this time of a different shape, resem- 

 bling a kidney, and with two cilia at the side. Other dif- 

 ferences in detail also exist. 



In this second active stage the "zoospore" moves abovit 

 for a time, and then once more comes to rest. It then ger- 

 minates, i.e., throws out a delicate tube, into which its con- 

 tents pass. If this occurs on the fly's exterior, the tube 

 enters the body, feeds on the matters there, and grows into 

 a new fungus plant. 



Besides this mode of rapid asexual multiplication, how- 

 ever, this fungus exhibits a totally different form of repro- 

 duction. 



Certain lateral branchlets swell up into bodies, each 

 resembling a grape attached by a short stalk : the proto- 

 plasm inside any one of these becomes arranged into rela- 

 tively large spheres, or into one large sphere. These spheres 

 are the eggs of the organism — corresponding to the eggs of 

 an animal — and are termed " oospheres." The membrane of 

 the grape-like structure containing them (" oosporangium") 

 becomes thick and firm and peculiarly marked. Each of 

 these eggs becomes later surrounded by a firm resistent 

 membrane and is then termed an "oospore": these "oospores" 



