TOND-LIFE. 



231 



into its transparent dwelling by the contraction of its 

 muscular stalk, gradually extending itself directly it has 

 recovered from the shock. How many thoughts which 

 positively bewilder one does such an insignificant thing as 

 this suggest ! 



Has this minute object in creation, then, a brain, 

 since a brain is the seat of sensation in every animal? 



Group of Yorticellse. 



Evidently there is as true muscular action as we superior 

 animals have. But the wonders of this speck of vitality 

 are by no means confined to the appearance it will present 

 when you find it revealing, apparently, its complicated 

 machinery, for its little life is not always to be affixed to 

 the weed upon which we find it. There are no organs of 

 locomotion visible in the Vorticeila while it is attached to 

 the stalk, which limits its sphere to the spot on which we 



