The Microscope:. 9 



tion of the protoplasm was still further advanced from the side 

 walls of the cells ; at the end of the fourth day the protoplasm 

 had entirely given up the work and was completely separated 

 from the cell walls and now floated in the limpid cell sap, usually 

 in one irregular mass, the M. germinatus apparently dead. The 

 cell sap is so transparent that we can see the partition walls very 

 clearlji ; the gateways already noted in the cell walls are so 

 demonstrabl}' plain that I can stud}'' and measure them most 

 satisfactorily, thus entirely convincing me that the}' are the 

 openings for the inter-communication of the protoplasm from 

 cell to cell. On the seventh day the Micrococcus giganteus 

 began to appear in this onion-juice mounted specimen. The 

 protoplasm is now breaking up into small irregular fragments, 

 its structure becoming more coarsely granular — very likely little 

 gas bubbles forming. 



Summary. — Isl. I feel persuaded that the observed phenom- 

 ena of protoplasmic action and reaction, resembling shock after 

 injury, denotes a form of sympathy between the several cells of 

 the plant, amounting to something like the equivalent of con- 

 sciousness, a form of knowledge of injury communicated from 

 cell to cell, perhaps by sensation, or more probably by some 

 sense unknown to us, yet implanted in our nature also, a con- 

 sciousness in the protoplasm. 



2d. The finding of our little bacterium, the Micrococcus 

 germinatus, in all the living, healthy cells, most abundant and 

 active when the onion has commenced to grow, and never after 

 the protoplasm is dead, is convincing evidence that it is one of 

 the working agents in the process of germination and which 

 can not be excluded without imperiling the process. 



Micrococcus germinatus, X. S. — Yery minute granular bodies 

 in the germinating cells, on and perhaps in the protoplasmic 

 mass, all globular, from .5 to la in diameter, the majority of 

 them about or somewhat less than l,a in diameter, containing 

 darkish contents. Also other spherical bodies in the more ad- 

 vanced cells 2.5,a in diameter, with a nucleus. I believe these 

 are advanced or older forms of the same species, but they need 

 more study. 



Bacterium refringente (provisional name, perhaps), N. 

 S. — A bacterium coming after rhe death of the protoplasm and 

 M. germinatus ; observed in great numbers in the decomposing 



