1883.] 



MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 



H3 



"To show the difficulty of these re- 

 searches, it will suffice to remeuiber 

 that the portions much less delicate, 

 such as the connectives, the raphe and 

 the nodules, give rise to interpreta- 

 tions very diverse." 



We have not given the whole of M. 

 Prinz's remarks, but in a later num- 

 ber we shall print a resume of some 

 very interesf'ng later results, obtained 

 by M. Prinz and Dr. Van Ermengem 

 working in conjunction upon this sub- 

 ject, to which the above will be an in- 

 troduction. 



Evenings with the Microscope. 



There are so many subjects that 

 would afford ample pleasure and in- 

 struction for an evening, that it is 

 difficult to choose one to write about. 

 A superabundance of material is fre- 

 quently quite as embarrassing as a 

 dearth of it. In beginning this article 

 we have not yet decided upon any 

 subject, but perhaps we will soon come 

 to one. People are often heard to 

 make comparisons between natural 

 objects, calling one more beautiful or 

 more interesting than another. Now, 

 it is very true that the wing-case of a 

 diamond beetle, mounted in balsam 

 and carefully illuminated with a bull's- 

 eye lens, is a more strikingly beautiful 

 object than many other things we see 

 under the microscope. But it maybe 

 doubted whether the golden sparkle 

 and brilliant green of the scales pos- 

 sesses any greater charm to the natur- 

 alist than does many a more common 

 object. Not that the naturalist is less 

 appreciative of the beauty which all 

 may see, but because he has a deeper 

 knowledge of the structure and adap- 

 tation of the things he studies than 

 any superficial glance can give, and 

 hence a be!ter appreciation of the ob- 

 ject as a whole. Therefore the student 

 of nature would say ; every natural 

 object is beautiful, and though some 



may be more pleasing to the eye than 

 others, such beauty is only superficial, 

 and the same kind of influences that 

 have in one case produced bright and 

 rich colors, in another have given us 

 subdued and common ones. Hence 

 it is, that so far from disregarding the 

 colors of natural objects, the natural- 

 ist attaches even greater importance 

 to them than the casual observer, who 

 sees only that they are bright and 

 pleasing ; never thinking of their 

 greater significance in the living 

 world. 



As microscopists and students of 

 nature, is not the pleasure and satis- 

 faction we get from the examination 

 of objects of whatever kind, enhanced 

 by the knowledge that all the. differ- 

 ent forms of minute shells and spicules, 

 diatoms, desmids and infusoria, indeed 

 from the lowest ihizopods and proto- 

 phytes, all through the range of plant 

 and animal life, every structure is the 

 result of one invariable natural law, — 

 the law of adaptation to envirorment ? 

 This is only another way of express- 

 ing the tendency manifested ihrorgh- 

 out the living world to improvement 

 ard higher development. 



At last we have found a subject 

 which will serve for an evening's work. 

 It is the mounting of polycystina. 

 When the surface of the sea is undis- 

 turbed by the wind, so that there is 

 scarcely a breeze to move the vessel 

 forward, if a fine surface-net were 

 thrown overboard and drawn slowly 

 through the water in mid ocean, it is 

 probable that a vast number of minute 

 floating protozoa would be collected. 

 Among these the radiolaria, to which 

 the polycystina belong, would be nu- 

 merous ; but besides the polycystina 

 there would be many beautiful, ex- 

 tremely delicate forms, which we 

 never find in the fossil deposits of 

 Barbadces, because they are too fra- 

 gile to be preserved as fossils. Seme 

 polycystina live upon or near the sur- 

 face, others at the bottom, and their 

 remains are found in great abundance 

 at depths of four or five miles from 

 the surface. The specimens we have 



