312 E. G. Spaulding 



may be regarded as due simply to certain difficulties in experi- 

 mental procedure which, of course, further refinements may over- 

 come. 



Accordingly, I shall consider that that which was my immediate 

 purpose, namely, the application to an organic event of the same 

 general principles as are applied to inorganic events, has resulted 

 successfully, and that thus a basis is furnished for answering the 

 other questions which were propounded at the beginning of my 

 paper. 



However, before that is done, an interpretation must be made 

 as to just what the results obtained show as to the character of the 

 energy-transfer which is involved in each cleavage. Here the 

 principles stated in our introduction and developed in our formu- 

 lation must guide us. 



In answering this question it must be said, in accordance, first, 

 with what was shown as to the conditions under which our measure- 

 ments must be taken, and, second, with the hypotheses formed as 

 to the forces, etc., in the egg as a system, that the numerical values 

 obtained for the energy-transfer in the two cleavages are the 

 measure, first, of the difference between the energy decrease and 

 its simultaneous increase, E = W -{-{Un — U^, during the event of 

 cleavage; and, second, of the resultant, in energy-terms, of all 

 those subsidiary processes and changes, morphological and other- 

 wise, which contribute to the event; some of these must be identical 

 with JV^ others with U^ — U^'y if there be any processes which do 

 not so contribute either directly or remotely, then, of course, they 

 are not included in this resultant. 



It is evident, then, first, that the result obtained allows for the 

 possible increase in the internal energy of the ovum by the absorp- 

 tion of heat, or other energy, though probably only the former, as 

 simultaneous with a decrease in accordance with which work is 

 done; and, second, that our result gives the measure, not of the 

 entire energy of the cell, but only of that which, as an excess of 

 the energy "lost" over that gained, is identical with the energy of 

 cleavage. 



What, now, is the character of the energy-form in which there 

 is this resultant decrease '^. To this the answer is indicated, first, 



