240 
1 
2 
3 
Lat. 
LEEUWENHOEK AND HIS “‘ LITTLE ANIMALS ”’ 
To the third sort I could assign no figure: for at times 
they seemed to be oblong, while anon they looked 
perfectly * round. ‘These were so small that I could see 
them no bigger than Fig. HK: yet therewithal they went 
ahead so nimbly, and hovered so together, that you might 
imagine them to be a big swarm of gnats or flies, flying in 
and out among one another. ‘These last seemed to me 
e’en as if there were, in my judgement, several thousand 
of ’em in an amount of water or spittle (mixed with the 
matter aforesaid) no bigger than a sand-grain; albeit 
there were” quite nine parts of water, or spittle, to one 
part of the matter that I took from betwixt my front 
teeth, or my grinders. 
Furthermore, the most part of this matter consisted of 
a huge number of little streaks, some greatly differing 
from others in their length, but of one and the same thick- 
ness withal; one being bent crooked, another straight, 
like Fig. F, and which lay disorderly ravelled together. 
And because I had formerly seen, in water, live animal- 
cules that had the same figure, I did make every 
endeavour to see if there was any life in them; but 
I could make out not the least motion, that looked lke 
anything alive, in any of ’em. 
I have also taken spittle from the mouths of two 
different womenfolk,’ that I’m sure clean their teeth 
every day, and examined it as narrowly as I was able to, 
but could discern therein no living animalcules. But 
afterwards I examined the same spittle mingled with 
a little of the matter that I picked out with a needle from 
betwixt their teeth : and then I discovered as many living 
volkomen is here in the printed text, but not in the manuscript. 
was MS.—corrected to waren in print. 
twee distincte Vrouwspersonen MS. and Dutch ed. binaruwm foeminarum 
5 ce ? 
ed. ‘‘two several women” Phil. Trans. (1684) other Persons ”’ 
Phil. Trans. (1693) “‘ two ladies’ Hoole (1798). It is almost certain that 
these were L.’s own womenfolk—his second wife Cornelia, and his daughter 
Maria. 
