262 FRANCIS DARAVI.V. 



an hour or so completely transformed and altered in appearance. 

 The glands are coloured of a faint green by the ammonia solu- 

 tions. The results obtained with fresh and putrid infusions of 

 raw meat have surprised me still more than the changes produced 

 by amraoniacal solutions. 



July ISth^ 10.50 a.m. — Sections cut from a young leaf of 

 second year's growth were mounted on slides, some in distilled 

 water, others in an infusion of raw meat ; owing to a mistake in 

 the notes I cannot say whether it was a fresh or putrid infusion. 

 The specimens were examined at 3. .30; those mounted in water 

 showed only fine whip-like filaments, whereas in the meat speci- 

 mens there were found enormously long and bulky filaments 

 something like those shown in fig. 11. The same kind of result 

 was obtained by five hours' immersion in fresli infusion of meat, 

 also in the following instance with putrid infusion. 



July 20th (between 11 and 12 noon). — A young 'cup' was 

 divided in the manner described above, one half being placed 

 in distilled water the other in putrid meat infusion. July 23rd, 

 10 a.m. (about seventy hours after immersion). — Sections were 

 cut from both halves and examined. In the meat specimens 

 there were astonishing masses of spherical and pear-shaped tran- 

 sparent filaments with some rope-like ones as much as '96 mm. 

 (_"_ inch) in length. Changes in form and in position were seen to 

 take place. The masses exactly resembled in appearance the trans- 

 parent filaments which are seen attached to glands after irriga- 

 tion with dilute solution of carbonate of ammonia, but here they 

 were attached to no glands ; they seemed to have been poured out 

 in enormous quantities and to have freed themselves from all 

 attachment. Unfortunately no record was kept of the condition 

 of the corresponding half of the 'cup' which had been in dis- 

 tilled water ; but from this fact it is probable that they presented 

 the normal appearance with thread-hke or slightly moniliform 

 filaments. On July 26th, at noon, the glands appeared to be 

 dead, but the protoplasmic masses (which were not attached to 

 glands) were still in movement. Fig. 11 was sketched with the 

 camera lucida. The masses vvere bright and highly refracting. 

 A curiously moniliform mass (not figured in the plate) was also 

 seen in very rapid movement. One mass was made to run into 

 a sphere and was almost or entirely dissolved by methylated 

 spirit. As I found that an infusion of putrid meat was faintly 

 alkaline it appeared possible that the results obtained with 

 ammonia, with carbonates of potassium and sodium, and with 

 meat infusions, were all due to their alkalinity. But this is cer- 

 taiidy not the case, as precisely the ordinary results were obtained 

 with meat infusions carefully neutralised with dilute citric acid. 

 Why solutions of carbonate of potassium and sodium should 



