DEATH OP BIOPLASM. 



forming, living or germinal matter, to which I have 

 more recently given the name bioplasm, has been 

 lately spoken of by others as protoplasm. And it 

 has been hinted, though not definitely stated in print, 

 that in my memoirs I had simply altered the name of 

 matter which had been previously described by others. 

 But such is not the fact as the most influential of my 

 opponents well know. The word protoplasm would 

 have been used by me had the term been restricted 

 to the matter of the tissues, which I termed living or 

 germinal matter, and which I showed, in my lectures 

 at the College of Physicians in 1861, underwent con- 

 version into formed matters, and was concerned in 

 forming all tissue. But under the term protoplasm 

 has been included, the contractile tissue of muscle, 

 the axis cylinder of the nerve fibres, processes of 

 nerve cells, and many other textures which un- 

 doubtedly consist of formed material, and are entirely 

 destitute of the properties which invariably belong to 

 my " germinal matter," or bioplasm.* Moreover, the 

 nucleus and nucleolus were by many writers considered 

 to be distinct from the protoplasm. On the other 

 hand I showed that the nucleus and nucleolus were 

 living. My bioplasm, germinal, or living matter 

 therefore includes both nucleus and nucleolus as well 

 as some forms of the protoplasmic matter of authors. 

 Moreover, my paper on germinal matter had been 

 written before the subject had been at all discussed, 

 either on the continent or in this country, from the 

 point of view I had taken up. Max. Schultze, who 

 wrote after me, concerning the nature of the cell-wall, 

 remarked that this structure had for me "only an 

 historical interest," and objected to my conclusions. 

 16. Deatb of Bioplasm. All bioplasm must die. 



* But Prof. Huxley has given a yet wider signification to the 

 word protoplasm, and makes it stand for almost any thing organic. 

 His new " protoplasm" may be dead or living, may exhibit struc- 

 ture or be perfectly structureless ; nay, it may be even boiled or 



