128 LEEUWENHOEK AND HIS ‘“‘ LITTLE ANIMALS ”’ 
Thereupon I put my observations upon rain-water on one 
side for the time being. 
[ Observations on River-water. | 
This town of Delft is very well off for water, and in 
summer we get fresh water into the town with all the 
floods seaward from the river Maas; wherefore the water 
within the town is very good, and river fish are caught 
every day by children with fishing-rods in the water- 
ways inside the town. This water being divers times 
examined by me, I discovered in it some exceeding small 
animalcules (so small, indeed, that I could scarce discern 
their figure) of sundry sorts and colours, and therewithal 
some that were much bigger; though were I to specify 
the motion and the make of every one of ’em, ’twould 
take all too long a-writing. But all these animalcules are 
very scanty in this water, compared with those that I saw 
in the rain-water; for if I discovered 25 animalcules in 
one drop of it, that was quite a lot.’ 
[Observations on Well-water.] 
I have in my yard,’ standing in the open air, a well, 
which is about 15-foot deep before you come to the 
water. It standeth at the south, but so encompassed 
with high walls, that even when the sun is in the sign of 
Cancer, the coping of the well is not shone upon. This 
water cometh out of the ground, which is well-sand, with 
such force, that whenever I have tried to empty the well 
there was always about a foot of water still leftin. On 
a summer’s day this water is so cold that ’tis not feasible 
to keep your hand in it for long. Having no thought 
that there would be living creatures in it (for ’tis very 
1 No identification of these “animalcules”’ can be attempted, though 
they must have been protozoa or bacteria. As some of them were coloured, 
it may be inferred that they included Phytoflagellates. 
> op mijn plaets MS. “In the open Court of my house’? Oldenburg 
dans ma cour Huygens. 
