338 SERGIUS MORGULIS 



Table 2, and it will be seen on looking through the sixth column 

 that the animals were continually losing in weight, so that some 

 six weeks after the operation was performed they had lost 46.8 

 per cent, or nearly half of the initial mass. The dry substance, as 

 usual, loses a larger proportion of itself than the water does, but 

 the difference between the two does not remain the same through- 

 out the entire regenerative process. This will become clearer upon 

 inspection of the curves of fig. 6, which shows at a glance the 

 changes in the weight of the worms, of the dry matter and of the 

 water, as well as in the percentage of water at different stages 

 of regeneration. It will be seen from this that the percentage of 

 water rises to a maximum ten days after the operation, or at the 

 time of the greatest regenerative energy; then it begins to decline, 

 tending to return to the normal level. The curve of dry matter 

 is regularly, and at first very rapidly, sloping downwards, but 

 in advanced stages of regeneration it remains practically hori- 

 zontal. The curve showing the quantity of water, however, falls 

 off more or less rapidly during the later stages when the per cent 

 of water is likewise diminishing, but remains at a constant level 

 at the time when the per cent of water in the regenerating 

 worms is rapidly rising. As was pointed out above, the per- 

 centage of water increases rapidly in the course of the first 

 few days because the organism, losing in weight, yields up more 

 dry substance than water (21.8 per cent and 8.3 per cent, respec- 

 tively in this experiment). But soon afterwards, since the dry 

 substance continues to waste away while the water, at least for 

 a limited time, does not, there is a still further increase in the per- 

 centage of water. 



The two curves of the percentage of water, figs. 5 and 6, are 

 essentially similar to each other. Both show a rapid increase in 

 the relative quantity of water when regeneration is most intense, 

 followed by a continual decrease corresponding in time to the 

 diminished regenerative activity. Minor differences between these 

 curves are partly due to the fact that they are based upon an 

 investigation of differents lots of worms, but more particularly, 

 as I believe, to the fact that the per cent of water was ascertained 

 at shorter intervals in the first instance. As to the behavior of 



