202 Transactions of the 



corpuscles, the largest a very great number. In many of the 

 medium size, and most, if not all, of the larger ones, the general 

 mass appeared to be vacuolated, often very irregularly, with the 

 outlines of the vacuoles indistinct, or rather ill-defined. Upon long 

 watching, the relation of these to each other might now and then 

 be seen to alter, yet there was no appearance of pulsation. In 

 only three examples were noticed any projections having the cha- 

 racter of pseudopodal protrusions, and tliese were exceedingly de- 

 licate, short, and seemed ill fitted for progression of the masses in the 

 ordinary manner of pseudopods. In several of the masses the general 

 shape could be seen to change slightly, and in two was noticed some 

 activity of the mass evinced by a restless kind of motion ; an effort 

 apparently to twist round on their axes, and this to the right hand, 

 as seen in the field of the microscope, then returning to a less than 

 their former position, towards the left or starting point. One was 

 watched for a period of about half an hour, yet it never made more 

 than one-quarter to one-third of a revolution. No motion could be 

 detected amongst the little granular bodies imhedded in the ordinary 

 masses. Their size was remarked to be very variable. In some of 

 the masses they were enlarged and separated to a considerable dis- 

 tance from each other, though adherent by the viscid protoplasmic 

 substance, and such masses appeared to have a general tendency to 

 difiiuence. In others, which seemed to have reached a particular 

 stage or period, the muco-gelatinous substance was condensed into a 

 distinct structureless cell-membrane or " cell-envelope," thus passing, 

 in all probability, into a sessile condition. One such mass was 

 removed along with several of the smaller viscid masses by a very 

 fine camel-hair pencil on to a growing slide, having a tin-foil cell 

 cemented to the centre, for the cover to rest on when over the 

 aperture in the slide, thus to give freedom of motion for any of 

 these small bodies ; but unfortunately putting down the thin cover- 

 ing-glass ruptured the " cell-envelope." The small granules or 

 corpuscles set free were watched under the microscope for some 

 period. ^ At first they moved somewhat slowly, but when at a httle 

 distance from the mass they jostled and jerked themselves about in 

 a very active manner, much after the fashion of motile zoospores ; 

 yet with a power of 2000, Gundlach's immersion, No. vii. A, I 

 failed to distinguish then or later any cilium. When two were 

 adherent by the viscid substance between them, the motions were 

 very violent, often as a sort of springing apart from each other to 

 obtain freedom. Very many of these little bodies soon jerked them- 

 selves- across and out of the field of the microscope. They soon 

 ceased to exhibit activity, and after thirty hours they were motion- 

 less, and had not regained it or altered in any visible particular ; 

 after fourteen days in the growing slide they appeared rather less 

 in size. It is very possible the "cell-envelope" was ruptured 



