340 THE MICROSCOPE. 



its dwelling. The little beings are very rapacious, although 

 but the 108th part of an inch in size. Floscularia Pro- 

 boscidea, " Horned floscularia," has six lobes, fringed with 

 cilia shorter than in the preceding species. Its name is de- 

 rived from a peculiar kind of horn or proboscis, also having 

 cilia placed in the centre of the lobes. The eggs cast off 

 by the parent enclosed in a sheath, are very pretty objects 

 for microscopic observation. In fact, the tinted case, the 

 light ethereal frame of the tiny animal, the variously 

 coloured food, &c., in the stomach, combine in rendering it 

 singularly interesting. 



Melicerta Ringens, "Beaded melicerta." Among the Me- 

 licerta, or " Honey floscularia," this is the most beautiful. 

 Its crystalline body is first enclosed in a pellucid covering, 

 wider at the top than the bottom, of a dark yellow or 

 reddish-brown colour, which gradually becomes encrusted 

 with zones of a variety of shapes, glued together by some 

 peculiar exudation that hardens in water : it is these little 

 pellets, appearing as rows of beads, give the name to 

 the animal. Mr. Gosse furnishes an excellent account of 

 the " architectural instincts of Melicerta ringens" which is 

 not only truly surprising, but full of interest. He writes : 

 " This is an animalcule so minute as to be with difficulty 

 appreciable by the naked eye, inhabiting a tube composed of 

 pellets, which it forms and lays one by one. It is a mason 

 who not only builds up his mansion brick by brick, but 

 makes his bricks as he goes on, from substances which he 

 collects around him, shaping them in a mould which he 

 carries upon his body. 



" The animal, as it slowly protrudes itself from its inge- 

 niously-formed mansion, appears a complicated mass of 

 transparent flesh, involved in many folds, displaying at 

 one side a pair of hooked spines, and at the other two 

 slender, short blunt processes projecting horizontally. As 

 it exposes itself more and more, suddenly two large rounded 

 discs are expanded, around which, at the same instant, 

 a wreath of cilia is seen performing its surprising motions. 

 Often the animal contents itself with this degree of ex- 

 posure ; but sometimes it protrudes farther, and displays 

 two other smaller leaflets opposite to the former, but ii 

 the same plane, margined with cilia in like manner. The 



