LESSON V 



PROTOMYXA AND THE MYCETOZOA 



WHEN Professor Haeckel was investigating the zoology of 

 the Canary Islands more than twenty years ago he discovered 

 a very remarkable organism which he named Protomyxa 

 aurantiaca. It was found in sea- water attached to a shell 

 called Spirula, and was at once noticeable from the bright 

 orange colour which suggested its specific name. Appar- 

 ently no one has since been fortunate enough to find it. 



In its fully developed stage Protomyxa is the largest of all 

 the organisms we have yet studied, being fully i mm. (^5 inch) 

 in diameter, and^ therefore visible to the naked eye as a 

 small orange speck. In general appearance (Fig. 6, A), it is 

 not unlike an immense Amoeba, the chief difference lying 

 in the fact that the pseudopods (psd) instead of being short, 

 b/unt processes, few in number (comp. Fig. i, p. 2) are very 

 numerous, slender, branching threads which often unite with 

 one another so as to form networks. No nucleus was ob- 

 served 1 and no contractile vacuole, but it is quite possible 

 that a renewed examination might prove the presence of one 

 or both of these structures. 



The figure (A) is enough to show that nutritio'n is holozoic; 



1 See p. 9, note. 



E 



