THE LIVING STRUCTURES 165 



tozoon and then devoured. The hunter infusoria are fre- 

 quently armed with trichocysts. Trichocysts are urtical 

 filaments, which serve the animalcula provided with them 

 to disable or wound other micro organisms. 



"A large number of infusoria, the paramecia, the ophry- 

 oglene, etc., use their trichocysts as organs of defense. 

 With other species of which we shall speak more at 

 length, the trychocysts are organs of offense. They are 

 located either in the sides of the mouth or in parts adja- 

 cent thereto. This is the case with the lacrymaria, the 

 didinium, the enchelys, the lagynus, the loxophyllum and 

 amphileptus. These latter animalcula attack live prey 

 that constitute their food in the following manner : They 

 dash upon their victim and bury the trychocysts with 

 which they are armed into its body. The victim is imme- 

 diately brought to a halt whereupon the hunter siezes it 

 and swallows it." 



There are a great number of species of single cells 

 which have invented weapons with which to fight their 

 enemy at a distance. These cells, that make weapons and 

 hunt their prey and also use them in defense, resemble 

 man in his savage state very closely. Still they are mic- 

 roscopic beings, similar to the amoeba and those cells 

 that build animals and plants. It seems to me absurd to 

 say that these individuals, (whether as large as a moun- 

 tain or smaller than a grain of sand), who display ability 

 to invent, make and use weapons, who organize them- 

 selves into high class societies and republics, and build all 

 the various living structures that we see are not endowed 

 with intelligence. The following is a description of the 

 cell who builds the human body from Conn and Buding- 

 ton's Advanced Physiology now used generally in the 

 high schools and universities. "The amoeba is one of 

 the simplest animals and lives in stagnant water. It is 



