IGO marvp:ls of pond-life. 



of a flower, or permitted to liang dishevelled like 

 tlie snake-locks of Medusa. We will suppose these 

 organs symmetricilly expanded, and that we are 

 looking down upon them with a magnifying power 

 of sixty diameters, the light having been carefully 

 adjusted by turning the reflecting mirror a little 

 on one side, to avoid a direct glare. The tentacles, 

 each of which curves with a living grace, and dis- 

 plays an opaline tint in its glassy structure, do 

 not form a complete circle, for at one place we 

 discern two slightly diverging arms of the disk, or 

 frame (Lophophore) from which they grow. 



These arms support tentacles on each side, and 

 leave a gap between, so that the whole pattern is 

 crescen^ic^ or crescent-shaped, and not circular. 

 Extending as far as the points of the arms, and 

 carried all round the crescent, is an extremely 

 delicate membrane, like the finest gauze, which 

 unites all the tentacles by their basal portions, and 

 makes an elegant scallop or retreating curve between 

 everv two. Each tentacle exhibits two rows of 

 cilia, which scintillate as their vibrations cause them 

 to catch the light. The motion of the cilia is in- 

 variably donm one side, and up the other, the 

 current or pattern being carried on from one tentacle 

 to the other, all through the series. This charac- 

 teristic, and the facility with which each cilium can 

 be distinguished, gives great interest and beauty 



