NEWEST IDEAS AS TO WHAT IS LIFE 



then the arms or branches themselves slowly draw 

 in, until only the trunk or body remains; finally 

 that, too, shrivels little by little, until this well- 

 developed organism, having a perfectly distinct and 

 characteristic form, has been reduced to an inchoate 

 huddle of gelatine-like stuff that can no more be 

 thought of as Campanularia than the Temple of 

 Diana might be inferred from the heaps of moulder- 

 ing stones about its site. 



But remove this formless mass from contact with 

 the solid substance, and restore it to its normal con- 

 ditions the huddle begins to take on shape, to ex- 

 tend, to grow, to throw out its arms, and from these 

 again the little fingers shoot out. Large as life and 

 twice as natural, one beholds Campanularia again. 

 Nor is this recession and redevelopment a mere 

 mechanical unfolding and refolding, like unto some 

 of the ingenious affairs devised for conjurers ; for the 

 formless mass of primitive substance may be turned 

 over, shaken up, and altogether so differently placed 

 that the idea of a reappearance of the old form with 

 exactly the same parts is untenable. It is a wholly 

 new Campanularia, whose structure and shape and 

 pans are not due simply to its internal organization, 

 but, so far from that, are so much a direct reaction 

 to external forces and conditions that the point 

 wlu-re the regrowth shall begin may be fixed at the 

 will nf the experimenter. In plainest word, this bit 



