96 THE AQUARIAN NATURALIST. 



for this purpose moved them about by pushing them 

 with a camel-hair pencil, but without effect. In about 

 half an hour afterwards, when I again observed them, 

 they were asunder, the Beroe swimming about, and 

 the cilia of its bands vibrating as briskly as usual. 

 It had not, however, escaped uninjured from its cap- 

 tor. The Callirhoe had taken from the body of the 

 Beroe f a huge half-moon, a monstrous cantle out/ 

 In fact, the portion thus removed occasioned a va- 

 cancy which extended transversely across three of the 

 bands, and longitudinally for about its entire length. 

 The being which had suffered this mutilation seemed, 

 however, quite unconscious of its misfortune, moved 

 about in every respect as before, and for four days 

 seemed to possess all its powers in unimpaired ac- 

 tivity." 



To this instance of apparent insensibility to pain, 

 may be added one illustrative of the extent to which 

 the principle of vitality is diffused through every por- 

 tion of the structure of these elegant Acalephs. On 

 one occasion, two Beroes were taken after a storm, 

 with some of the cilia abraded, and other parts of the 

 body shattered and even torn. All the cilia, however, 

 which remained attached to these mutilated parts re- 

 tained their full activity. The most damaged of the 

 two was then cut, with a pair of scissors, into several 

 pieces, and each part continued to exhibit in its cilia 

 the same undiminished rapidity of movement. One 

 of these portions was again subdivided into parts so 

 minute as to possess only one, or at most two cilia 

 on each, yet no change in the ceaseless motion of 

 these extraordinary organs took place. Thirty-three 



