SLEEP 169 



dust particles mixed with the dried mud of a drop of 

 dirty water. They may be kept in this state for months 

 even years. I do not know that any limit has been 

 ascertained. But when you add pure rain-water to the 

 dust in the watchglass, it softens, and in less than an 

 hour the little wheel-animalcules have softened too, and 

 expanded into life, swimming about whilst the delicate 

 spikes on their " wheels " vibrate regularly as though they 

 had never ceased to do so, and as though the animalcules 

 had not for years been dried- up little mummies, 



Of course, the term " suspended animation " has been 

 applied in earlier times to the often exaggerated stories 

 of " trance " and deathlike sleep in human beings. But 

 it is now with more justice applied to these instances of 

 dried animalcules which return to life when wetted, and 

 to similar cases of prolonged retention of vitality by 

 seeds, since it would appear that in these dried ani- 

 malcules life really is actually and totally suspended, 

 although the mechanism is there which resumes its life 

 when the necessary moisture is supplied. In cases of 

 trance in man and hibernation in animals, the heart is 

 still very slowly and feebly beating, and the breathing 

 is still almost imperceptibly at work. The chemical 

 changes are still very slowly and gently proceeding. 

 The buried Indian wizard, and the snail, and the Sleep- 

 ing Beauty are moist, and chemically active, though 

 feebly so ; life is not absolutely suspended. But in the 

 dried animalcule (though complete chemical desiccation 

 is not effected), the removal of the water from the body 

 actually arrests the changes which we call life, just as a 

 needle may arrest the balance-wheel of a watch. Supply 

 the water, or remove the needle, and life ceases to be 

 suspended ; it goes on once more (as one of the rules of 

 Bridge ambiguously enacts) " as though no mistake had 

 been made." 



