194 ARCHER, ON STEPHANOSPHERA PLUVIALIS. 
there thereupon occurs a contraction of the cell-contents of 
the conjugating joints. Presently one of these protoplasmic 
masses passes over through the canal, to combine into a single 
spore with that in the opposite cell. Now, the collective mass 
which is about to pass over is actually of greater diameter 
than the transverse canal through which it has to make its 
way. This, of course, can only be effected by a process 
essentially similar to that which the cell contents adopted or 
underwent in the curious exceptional case in the Mesotznium 
described by mysclf,—in other words, by calling into play its 
own inherent contractile power. 
It is true that Professor de Bary,* in speaking of the 
wonderful phenomenon of the seeking out of the germ-cell on 
the part of spermatozoids, and of the not less wonderful 
phenomenon of conjugation, suggests that in the former in- 
stance the active ciliated spermatozoids, and in the latter the 
conjugating protoplasmic masses, are impelled by a kind of 
attraction exerted upon the other on the part of that which in 
either instance is the receiving cell. But, granting that the 
motive force impelling in its normal direction the protoplasmic 
mass which actually passes over may be an attraction on the 
part of the other (this, indeed, must be a mutual attraction 
in those Conjugatz which form their spores halfway), yet this 
does not affect the modus operandi of the actual change of 
place, that is, the means by which the locomotion is effected. 
In CGidogonium, Spheeroplea, &c., this presumed attraction, 
then, draws over into its sphere bodies moving by cilia; 
but in Spirogyra it acts upon bodies, if I be right, moving 
their little distance in an amceboid manner. In either in- 
stance this presumed attraction may influence the ultimate 
direction of the movement of the bodies acted upon, but 
cannot excite that movement, nor can it affect the mode of 
progression. That it cannot excite it even in Conjugate is 
certain, as in the case of the Mesotznium observed by me, 
above cited, no such attractive force could exist: there was 
no conjugation ; and the exit of the “ primordial utricle ” 
with contents was, so to speak, a purely spontaneous action 
—a purely automatic relinquishing of its previously apparently 
too narrow limits, and, as I have above endeavoured to con- 
vey, by a kind of motion to all intents and purposes 
“amoeboid” in its character. 
In all these cases active mobility is evinced by the pro- 
trusion of what may be called, indeed, pseudopodal extensions ; 
and the result, as in Amoeba itself, is not only change of 
form, out actual locomotion. 
* Untersuchungen tiber die Familie der Conjugaten,’ p. 59, 
