i92 



THE AMEEICAN MONTHLY 



[October) 



question of the cau e of the potenti- 

 ally endless life of the Protozoa, 

 and of the unconditional, necessary 

 death of the Metazoa. For the an- 

 swering of this question he has pro- 

 pounded a new hypothesis. From the 

 analogy between the phenomena of 

 life and the processes of fermentation, 

 he conjectures that there may be a 

 special ferment of life, which, among 

 the Protozoa, is always renewed by 

 nutrition in the body ; in the Meta- 

 zoa, on the contrary, the ability to 

 renew this life-ferment is restricted 

 entirely to the reproductive cells, 

 which are thus potentially undying, 

 while in the other parts of the or- 

 ganism it is entirely used up, thus 

 rendering the complicated (metazoic) 

 organisms subject to death. 



After careful consideration of this 

 hypothesis of the learned author, 

 touching upon such important gener- 

 al questions, and after the application 

 of it to various low, multicellular or- 

 ganisms, we saw that, in some cases, 

 we came upon contradictory evi- 

 dence. How, by means of this hy- 

 pothesis, is it to be explained, that 

 with those Metazoa which present a 

 sexual as well as an asexual repro- 

 duction {Jljdra, for example) all 

 cells are not undying, but a large 

 number of them die although the 

 supposed ferment of life, that must 

 pass over to the successors, neverthe- 

 less spreads over the whole body and 

 in the whole body is renewed ? If 

 all the cells of the body of such ani- 

 mals possess the power to produce a 

 new individual, they must also have 

 the power to produce the so-called 

 life-ferment, and be, therefore, ac- 

 cording to Biitschli, undying. This, 

 however, is not the case, because 

 some of them die. 



It appears to us that the cause of the 

 death of the Metazoa is to be found in 

 the multicellular structure of their or- 

 ganization. A single cell always pos- 

 sesses, of and for itself, a potentiality 

 of unending life ; but so soon as the 

 differentiating cells combine into a 

 compound individual, they succumb 



within it to the struggle for existence 

 which takes place (as Roux expresses 

 it to the " Kampf derTheile im Or- 

 ganismus ") which, is very irregularly 

 waged, and at last eo ipso leads to the 

 destruction of the whole, and to 

 death. It follows from this, that it is 

 not at all necessary for the explana- 

 tion of the potentially continuous life 

 of Protozoa, and of the inevitable 

 death among the Metazoa, to ad- 

 vance a new hypothesis, as we can 

 explain these facts by a simple and logi- 

 cal interpretation, namely, through 

 the principle of the struggle for ex- 

 istence. 



The hypothesis of Biitschli calls to 

 mind, involuntarily, Darwin's hy- 

 pothesis of pangenesis. As, accord- 

 ing to Darwin, the hypothetical gran- 

 ules separated from the multiplying 

 cells are at first supposed to be dis- 

 tributed in all parts of the organism, 

 and later to be concentrated in the 

 reproductive cells, so, according to 

 Biitschli, the life-ferment, at first dis- 

 seminated in all parts of the body, 

 finally becomes concentrated entirely 

 in the reproductive cells, in conse- 

 quence of their exclusive ability to 

 produce it. Hence, we may regard 

 the hypothesis of Butschli as a physi- 

 ological paraphrase of the more mor- 

 phological Darwinian hypothesis of 

 pangenesis. 



o 



Some Tegetable Poisons. 



BY T. J. BURRILL. 



During several years I have occa- 

 sionally noticed within the closed 

 cells of apparently healthy plants, of 

 divers kinds, numerous actively mov- 

 ing particles which in form and 

 motion were undistinguishable from 

 some kinds of the living organisms 

 we call bacteria. But inorganic as well 

 as organic particles living or dead 

 of very minute size, immersed in a 

 fluid, quiver and oscillate under the 

 microscope like things of independ- 

 ent life. This is what 'is called Brown- 

 ian motion. It is exceedingly difficult 

 in many cases to distinguish these 



