108 THE HARMONIES OF NATURE. 



may be frequently inferred from the agitation of minute 

 particles in the currents they produce. Simple as these organs 

 are, they harmonise beautifully with the wants of the little 

 creatures to whom they have been given; they are useful as 

 oars, as arms, as tentacles ; they hurry along the food with- 

 out further trouble to the mouth ; they serve also for respira- 

 tion, by bringing successive portions of water into contact with 

 the surface of the animal, and are indeed no less admirable in 

 their way than the elephant's proboscis or the chameleon's tongue. 

 Sometimes instead of a multitude of short cilia, as, for instance, 

 in Leucophrys patula, we find a small number of long slender 

 filaments, usually proceeding from the vicinity of 

 the mouth, while in other cases the filaments are 

 comparatively short, and have a bristle-like firm- 

 ness, and instead of being kept in vibration they 

 are moved by the contraction of the substance 

 to which their bases are attached, in such a man- 

 ner that the animalcule crawls by their means 



Leucophrys V6r a SO l id SUrfaCC. 



patuia. Thus in this little world of animalcules, which 



still contains so many unravelled secrets, we find almost all the 



modes of movement of the 

 higher aquatic animals 

 the darting of the fish, the 

 hop of the Daphnia, the 

 gyrations of the water- 

 beetle, and the tardy 

 creeping of the leech. 



The bell-shaped Vor- 

 ticella, one of the largest, 

 is also one of the most 

 beautiful and interesting 

 of the Infusoria. In its 

 first youth it swims freely 

 about in the stagnant 

 waters, but at a later 

 period it attaches itself 

 by a long stalk (g) to the 



b,c,d,e,f, exhibit the various steps of fissiparous leaves of dlick-weed Or 



reproduction in this animalcule 



the carapaces or shells of water-fleas or lacustrine snails, where 



