SIMPLE IMBEDDING. 139 



in any desired position under the microscope " (Journ. Rog~. 

 Mic. Soc. (N.S.), ii, p- 880). 



SELENKA has recently described and figured a simple but 

 perhaps more efficacious apparatus having the same object. 

 It consists of a glass tube through which a stream of warm 

 water may be passed and changed for cold as desired, the object 

 being placed in a depression in the middle of the tube (see 

 Zool. Anz.j 1885, p. 419). A modification of this method is 

 described by ANDREWS in Amer. Natural., 1887, p. 101; cf. 

 Zeit.f. wiss. Mik., iv, 3, 1887, p. 375. 



For small paraffin objects the following procedure is very 

 useful. The object is removed from the paraffin solution, the 

 superfluous fluid is removed by means of blotting-paper, and 

 the object placed on a cylinder of paraffin. A piece of stout 

 iron wire is now heated in the flame of a spirit-lamp, and with 

 it a hole is melted in the end of the cylinder, the specimen is 

 pushed into the melted paraffin and placed in any desired 

 position. The advantages of the method lie in the quickness 

 with which it can be performed, and in the fact that by the 

 melting of so small a quantity of paraffin all risk of injury to 

 the tissues by overheating is done away with. 



This method may also be used for simple imbedding in the 

 case of solid objects without cavities or irregular outline. 

 They are transferred direct from alcohol to the paraffin- 

 cylinder, and when sections are cut they readily separate 

 from the shaving of paraffin without the application of 

 turpentine. 



I strongly recommend the reader not to neglect this simple 

 method, which is capable of sometimes rendering services 

 which no other method can. Those who have to do work 

 with objects so small that their position can only be made out 

 with the aid of a powerful lens, ought to know how to arrange 

 an object with a heated needle under a dissecting microscope, 

 or on the object-carrier of the microtome. 



[In the 1st edition, this procedure was attributed to 

 KINGSLEY. It appears to have been first published by BORN. 

 see "Die Plattenmodellirrnethode," in Arch. f. mik. Anat., 

 1883, p. 591.] 



There remains the watch-glass method. Melt paraffin in a 

 watch-glass, and throw the object into it ; or place the object 

 in the watch-glass, add solid paraffin and warm. After the 



