VITAL MOVEMENTS. 43 



tance equal to its own length or more. Protrusions would 

 occur principally at one end, and the general mass would 

 gradually follow. Again, protrusions would take place in 

 the same direction, and slowly the remainder of the cor- 

 puscle would be drawn onwards, until the whole had 

 been removed from the place it originally occupied, and 

 would advance onward for a short distance in the mucus in 

 which it was embedded. From the first protrusions smaller 

 protrusions very often occur, and these gradually become 

 pear-shaped, remaining attached by a narrow stem, and in a 

 few seconds perhaps again become absorbed into the 

 general mass. From time to time, however, some of the 

 small spherical portions are detached from the parent mass, 

 and become independent masses of germinal matter, which 

 grow until they become ordinary mucus corpuscles. (PI. II, 

 fig. 2.) Are these phenomena, I would ask, at all like 

 any known to occur in lifeless material ? 



The component particles evidently alter their positions 

 in a most remarkable manner. One particle may move in 

 advance of another, or round another. A portion may 

 move into or round another portion. A bulging may occur 

 at one point of the circumference, or at ten or twenty 

 different points at the same moment. The moving power 

 evidently resides in every particle of a very transparent, 

 invariably colourless, and structureless material. By the 

 very highest powers only an indication of minute spherical 

 particles can be discerned. Because molecules have been 

 seen in some of the masses of moving matter, the motion has 

 been attributed to these. It is true the molecules do move, 

 but the living transparent material in which they are situated 



