1897 THE MICROSCOPE. 5 
Three Drops of Water. 
By T. 0. REYNOLDS, M. D. 
KINGSTON, N. H. 
It is, always has been, and may always be a popular 
notion that, if submitted to microscopical examination 
any drop of water teems with animal life and in truth is 
a little cosmos of itself. Now, the fact is that pure 
water contains nothing discoverable under the most 
powerful instruments ever yet made. What then is the 
cause for this floating idea among the better informed 
people ? 
Is it the ‘‘fakirs” who infest our fair-grounds and com- 
mons with their “powerful microscopes” magnifying 
twenty five or forty diameters (!), with a previously pre- 
pared drop of water (pure, 10 cents a peep), and the 
crude notions of some of our newspaper people, school 
teachers, and clergymen? Probably. 
Now let us get down to the real; have no ten cents 
about it. Step in and look with a good microscope. 
What do we find ? 
1. In pure water nothing whatever. 
2. In water coming from stagnant pools or still coves 
of ponds or Jakes where dead or decaying vegetable 
matter is abundant, hundreds of animals. The dazzling, 
delightful rotifer; the skipping paramecium; the grotes- 
que daphne; mixed with probably hundreds of little 
chaps the names of which are altogether too long for 
their size and importance in the animal world. 
3. Now, there is another drop of water commanding 
our attention, of perhaps more real vital importance than 
the former two. It is that water which contains bacteria. 
A drop of water may appear pure, and even under ordi- 
nary powers of magnification seem pure; yet, under a 
good 1-10 or 1-12 iach objective, it way show typhoid 
fever germs, e¢cetera, which render the said water in all 
