626 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1742. 



The second part, which has no head, gets one ; a mouth forms itself, at the 

 anterior end, and shoots forth arms. This reproduction comes about more or 

 less quickly, according as the weather is more or less warm. In summer, he 

 has seen arms begin to sprout out 24 hours after the operation, and the new 

 head perfected in every respect in a few days. Each of those parts thus become 

 a perfect polypus, performs absolutely all its functions. It creeps, it eats, it 

 grows, and it multiplies ; and all that, as much as a polypus which never had 

 been cut. 



In whatever place the body of a polypus is cut, whether in the middle, or 

 more or less near the head, or the posterior part, the experiment has always 

 the same success. If a polypus be cut transversely, at the same moment, into 

 3 or 4 parts, they all equally become so many complete ones. 



The animal is too small to be cut at the same time into a great number of 

 parts ; he therefore did it successively. He first cut a polypus into 4 parts, and 

 let them grow, next he cut those quarters again ; and at this rate he proceeded, 

 till he had made 30 out of one single one : and here he stopped, for there 

 would have been no end of the experiment. He has several parts of the same 

 polypus, cut into pieces about a year before ; since which time, they have pro- 

 duced a great number of young ones. 



A polypus may also be cut in two, lengthways. Beginning by the head, one 

 first splits the head, and afterwards the stomach : the polypus being in the 

 form of a pipe, each half of what is thus cut lengthways forms a half-pipe ; the 

 anterior extremity of which is terminated by the half of the head, the half of 

 the mouth, and part of the arms. It is not long before the two edges of those 

 half-pipes close, after the operation. They generally begin at the posterior 

 part, and close up by degrees to the anterior part. Then each half-pipe be- 

 comes a whole one, complete : a stomach is formed in which nothing is want- 

 ing, and out of each half-mouth a whole one is formed also. 



He has seen all this done in less than an hour ; and that the polypus, pro- 

 duced from each of those halves, at the end of that time did not differ from 

 the whole ones, except that it had fewer arms ; but in a few days more grew 

 out. He has cut a polypus lengthways, between 7 and 8 in the morning ; and 

 between 2 and 3 in the afternoon, each of the parts has been able to eat a worm 

 as long as itself. 



If a polypus be cut lengthways, beginning at the head, and the section be 

 not carried quite through ; the result is, a polypus with two bodies, two heads, 

 and one tail. Some of those bodies and heads may again be cut lengthways, 

 soon after. In this manner he has produced a polypus that had 7 bodies, as 



