392 THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



In addition to the presence of these peculiar tubu- 

 lating cells in Spirogyra, Mr. Carter frequently found 

 many Astasi<e either in the same or in different fila- 

 ments, and owing to the supposed absence of other 

 means of accounting for the presence of these organ- 

 isms, he hazarded the not very convincing guess that 

 they may have been derived from some of the liberated 

 germs of the tubulating cells. The important point., how- 

 ever, is Mr. Carter's statement of the fact that c young 

 Astastte are also developed within the cells of Spirogyra 

 to a great extent.* He says they at first exhibit almost 

 as much polymorphism as an Amoeba, though after a 

 time they assume the form and exhibit the movements 

 peculiar to Astasi<e. 



On other occasions Mr. Carter has seen peculiar 

 filaments appear within the closed cells of Spirogyra. 

 There is, he says, c frequently a development of long, 

 slender, colourless filaments, which have a writhing 

 movement like that of an injured earth-worm/ and 

 some of the filaments present a faint appearance of 

 segmentation. Mr. Carter also states that such bodies 

 may be met with in Desmids. He says : c The same 

 kind of filaments occasionally appear in Closterium ace- 

 rosum when its contents are passing into dissolution, 

 but long before the chlorophyll has changed colour or 



(Pritchard, pi. xxviii. figs. 65-71) ; whilst Claparede and Lachmann have 

 seen the same kind of organisms appear within certain non- encysted 

 Infusoria (' Ann. of Nat. Hist.' vol. xix. p. 238). The subsequent fate of 

 the liberated particles (germs) is very uncertain and needs further 

 investigation, 



