274 EVENINGS AT THE MICKOSCOPE. 



What is very strange, is, that the male has no shell, no 

 spines, no month, no jaws, no stomach, no intestines ; 

 no ciliary "wheels : its cilia, which are very lono- and 

 powerful, being arranged in one circle round the whole 

 front. Its moyements are exceedingly fleet. 



Perhaps jon are tired of jBrachionvs, and are ready 

 to cry out " Ohe ! jam satis ! " * Well, then, I will 

 turn him off and show you another elegant little crea- 

 ture the Whiptail {Mastigocerca carinata). I haye 

 here in a bottle some stalks of the "Water-Horsetail 

 {Cliara vulgaris)^ which I obtained in a pond a few 

 weeks ago. These I examine in this way. Taking hold 

 of the Cliara with a pair of pliers, I pull it partially 

 out of water, and, allowing it to rest on the neck 

 of the bottle, I cut off with a pair of scissors, or with a 

 penknife on my nail, about one-fourth of an inch of the 

 tips of three of four leayes, which adhere together by 

 their wetness. These tips I place in the liye-box with a 

 drop of water, and having separated them with a 

 needle, I put on the cover, and examine them with a 

 triple pocket lens ; holding up the box perpendicularly, 

 not opposite the light, but obliquely, so that the field 

 is dark ; but the light reflected and refracted by the 

 animalcules shows them out beautifully white and dis- 

 tinct even the minute ones. The forms and some char- 

 acters of the middling and larger can be quite dis- 

 cerned thus ; for example, the slender tail of the one I 

 am now going to show you, I can thus see. Tlie posi- 

 tion of any particular individual to be examined being 

 thus marked, it is readily put under the object-glass of 

 the microscope. I have found these leaves very pro 



* " dear ! quite enough of this ! " 



