THE BLOOD OF MAGELONA. 9 
takes place naturally at the edge of the masses first, and then 
the mass presents the appearance of a colourless, oily-looking 
drop, in which more or less numerous rounded granules are 
embedded (fig. 12). These granules are the globules, and the 
longer the water acts the fewer distinct globules remain, till 
finally the mass of globules is replaced by a homogeneous, oily- 
looking drop (fig. 13). Meanwhile the movement already de- 
scribed in the fresh blood is going on, and is aided by the current 
of water as it is drawn under the cover-slip ; the narrow bridges 
uniting the masses become drawn out into longer and thinner 
threads—the globules of which they were composed have fused, 
and the threads, like the masses at the nodes of the network, 
become homogeneous. These threads may thin out till they 
break, the two ends are drawn into the masses at the nodes, 
and the latter become rounded off. In such a way the network 
may be resolved into a number of larger and smaller droplets, 
clear, colourless, and without any indication of the globules of 
which they were originally composed. 
If a group of globules or corpuscles not forming part of a 
network be examined, it can be readily seen that the neighbour- 
ing globules do fuse with one another, forming larger 
globules: these larger ones fuse with others, and thus, as a 
greater and greater number of globules become involved, a 
great oily-looking droplet is formed, in which all trace of the 
original globules has disappeared. In this reaction there is no 
swelling up of the original globule—neighbouring globules 
fuse with one another (fig. 14). 
The addition of normal salt solution to such a mass, so as 
to replace the water, did not lead to the reconstitution of 
separate globules, so that there can be no mistake about the 
actual fusion. 
Such a droplet is shown in fig. 16; after salt solution has 
been added, it lost its circular shape, and became irregular 
there being a marked movement—almost amoeboid in general 
appearance; and small irregular outgrowths comparable to 
pseudopodia became formed, and some of these separated from 
the mass as pear-shaped, and later circular droplets (z.). It 
