98 BIOPLASM OF BA CTERIA. 



selves as if they had been able to give a full and 

 sufficient explanation of the phenomenon, but there 

 is nothing in their statements to justify the confidence 

 which they seem to repose in the correctness of their 

 views. The cause of these movements is unknown, if 

 it is not unknowable. An attempt has been made to 

 delineate the appearance of the moving matter in 

 question in Plate V., fig. 30, which was examined 

 under a power of 5,000 diameters. The difference in 

 the shading indicates changes in thickness resulting 

 from the movement 



Bioplasm of Bacteria. If a large bacterium be 

 crushed, the very simply living matter may sometimes 

 be expressed from the envelope without injury, and may 

 be seen to exhibit vital movements, while in the field of 

 the microscope, Fig. i. The progressional movements 

 of many of the simplest organisms are effected by the 

 bioplasm of their bodies protruding through the pores 

 in their investing membrane or shell, by currents in 

 the fluid caused by the movement of the living matter, 

 and by the action of this same self-moving living 

 material upon processes of the envelope or other 

 passive organs composed of formed material project- 

 ing from different parts of the surface. 



Vital Movements of Bioplasm. These movements, 

 which take place in every kind of bioplasm, or living 

 matter, and which are to be observed so easily in the 

 amoeba, were formerly supposed to be peculiar to this 

 organism. When it was discovered that the same 



