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LETTER 18. GINGER- AND CLOVE-WATER 155 
The llth ditto, the oval animalcules were in greater 
number, mostly swimming at the top, against the thin 
film that had come again over the water. On this 
occasion I marvelled to see the violence that the first- 
mentioned little living creatures’ exercised, whenever 
they came out of the water on to a dry place, ere they 
fell a-dying. 
The 12th ditto, the oval animalcules were now in great 
plenty, as well as the other animalcules: and because the 
film that lay upon the water had grown in thickness, I 
poured the water and ginger away.” 
[Observations on Clove-water. | 
On the 17th of May, 1676, I placed 36 cloves in some 
24 ounces of rain-water, after I had first of all examined 
the rain-water and found nought therein (so far as 
animalcules are concerned), save a very few creatures 
that were roundish, and which looked to my eye, through 
my microscope, no bigger than a coarse sand-grain doth 
to one’s naked eye. 
The 25th of May. Up to this date I could perceive no 
living creatures, notwithstanding the many observations 
I had made since the 17th of this month. I now added 
more rain-water (wherein I could discern no animalcules) 
to the cloves. 
The 12th of July. After I had made divers observa- 
tions on this water, and between-times had filled up the 
tea-cup with water once more; and having no thought 
that I should discover living creatures in this water, so 
i.e., those seen on May 29 (? Cyclidiwm). 
? T. again digresses at this point in order to describe the structure of 
the macerated ginger itself. After a long description and discussion— 
occupying more than one whole page of the MS.—he returns to the subject 
of animalcules, and at this point my translation is resumed. Nothing of 
protozoological or bacteriological importance is contained in the lines which 
I have omitted. 
