The Microscope. 5 



CONSCIOUSNESS IN PROTOPLASM ; 



AND THE BACTERIA OF GERMINATION, MICROCOCCUS GERMINATUS, 

 N. S., WITH SOME OTHER NEW BACTERIA. 



DR. HENRY SHIMER. 



II. 



I^HE protoplasm is densel}^ full of little granules ; these are 

 continually moving about, vibrating and gyrating as 

 only the cocci of bacteria do. By carefully watching we see 

 them changing positions as much as 10;/, ten times their diam- 

 eter, in a few minutes ; but we must study them more particu- 

 larly in view of the lesson they invite us to investigate. These 

 o-ranules are verv minute bodies. I do not mean the granules 

 of the protoplasm itself, for it is made up of minute gelatinous 

 granules ; I mean those sharply-definable, dust-like specks more 

 or less abundantly sprinkling the protoplasm in the cells, appear- 

 ing like bright little bodies in an over focusing, where we catch 

 the light as it comes through them, but they appear dark in a 

 little lower focus. They all seem busy at their work of vibrat- 

 ing, rotating or slowly progressing, all globular cocci-like bodies 

 i to l.'j. in diameter; they are all over the protoplasm, in every 

 cell, apparently on its surface ; and now the protoplasm being 

 at rest we can examine them more satisfactorily than in the 

 streaming protoplasm. Under twelve hundred diameters they 

 are seen more advantageously, the motion magnified in the 

 same degree, all spherules, the great majority about 1/^ in diam- 

 eter, a few smaller. We observe several, a small per cent, how- 

 ever, of the whole number, much larger spherical bodies averag- 

 ing about 2.5,'^-. in diameter ; in these we observe large, bright 

 central nuclei, the wall somewhat thickish. After this careful 

 stud}^ many times repeated, I have no doubt of their identity ; 

 they are some species of bacteria of the genus micrococcus. 

 They ma}^ be new to science. I am sure they are new to me, 

 but I am not acquainted with everybody in the world or with 

 their work; I find no account of this bacterium in Crook- 

 shank's manual of the bacteria, last edition. For the purposes 

 of this preliminary report I will venture to name them Micro- 

 coccus germinatus^ n. s., the bacteria of germination. Their 

 motions seem to be almost voluntary, although classified among 



