112 WwW. ARCHER. 
is resumed. But normally, during progression, these bodies 
may sometimes represent rather a semi-fusiform figure, that 
is, one side may be rectilinear, this latter, when presented, 
being the side applied to the capillary filament upon which 
it travels, and the convex side raised up therefrom. During 
progression a still greater alteration of figure from the ordi- 
nary fusiform may present itself when one of these bodies 
arrives at a fork of the filament; then, as it were uncertain 
as to which route it ought to take, it becomes itself bifurcated, 
and one leg follows one branch of the filament, the other leg 
the other branch, and so the little body, now triradiate, may 
for some time remain stationary, as it were, astride upon the 
bifurcation. 
These little eminently plastic bodies (one might roughly 
compare one to a piece of glazier’s putty, or to dough) are, 
in fact, tdentical with the little rounded or globular bluish 
homogeneous looking little granules in the central mass to 
which attention was at first directed, and which are distinctly 
fusiform only when upon the capillary filaments, although, in- 
deed, before they arrive there they may, some of them, appear 
elliptic or subfusiform. That they are really one and the 
same thing, notwithstanding the difference of figure between 
them as a rule, is seen by watching the rounded granules 
deliberately proceed out of the general central mass and pass 
up along one of the filaments; as soon as it has done so and 
begins to travel upwards, the globose figure is lost and the 
fusiform outline is assumed. Soon follows another and 
another, in just the same manner, and a more or less long 
cortége begins its curious procession. By-and-by some of the 
little bodies may retrograde, remain stationary, or again 
advance, or all may become drawn in, capillary filaments and 
all, and the whole become reabsorbed into the great central 
mass. When one of the little spindles returns from its jour- 
ney it passes down from off the capillary support and reas- 
sumes a globose figure, and joins the rest of the similar 
granules within the central mass. 
It is when a great ramified tree is thus formed, under the 
observer’s eye, perhaps in ten or twenty minutes, and numer- 
ous capillary filaments spread in every direction, up and 
down and laterally and round about, these well laden with 
spindles and the central mass thus thinned out and wide 
spread and relieved of so great a proportion of the granular 
contents, that the beautiful play of vacuoles referred to can be 
seen, and the whole object presents a spectacle, in its way, of 
unusual and exceeding beauty (Pl. V1). It must be borne in 
mind that the example figured, amply furnished with ramifica- 
