THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 2O1 



completely motionless condition, and presented no 

 trace of a cilium so that they were quite different 

 from the specimens of Monas lens. In one infusion of 

 hay in which such organisms had been present for 

 some time, several of them were found to have become 

 spherical and to have undergone a considerable in- 

 crease in size after a few days of warmer weather. 

 Some were as much as 2 * " in diameter, and the 

 stages in the actual transition of one of these uni- 

 cellular organisms into an Amoeba was seen with the 



FIG. 54. 



Representing gradual enlargement of Corpuscular Organisms, and 

 conversion of one of them into an Amoeba. ( X 800.) 



most perfect distinctness. One half of the organism 

 was obviously amoeboid in character, whilst the other 

 half was almost unchanged, containing large granules 

 like those in the unaltered corpuscles. Whilst slow 

 alterations in shape, of a slug-like character, took place 

 in the anterior diaphanous protoplasmic portion, slow 

 rolling movements occurred amongst the granules in 

 the posterior cell-like part, whose matrix seemed to 

 have been rendered more fluid. Having watched this 

 organism for about half an hour, and wishing to exa- 

 mine other portions of the specimen of pellicle in 

 which it had been contained, I moved the glass, and 

 was afterwards unable to find this particular specimen 



