216 SEA-SIDE STUDIES. 



the digestive process were mechanical, tlie meat would be 

 protected from all grinding action, by the silver covering ; 

 if chemical, the meat would be digested ; and digested (or 

 rather chymified) it proved to be ; showing that a solvent 

 fluid had penetrated the holes, and dissolved the meat. I 

 took a piece of quill, of about half an inch in length, open at 

 both ends, and having six good openings cut in the sides, 

 thus affording ample means for any solvent fluid to exert 

 its action on the roast-beef enclosed in the quill. On exa- 

 mination of the ejected quills, I found no appreciable differ- 

 ence between the contained meat, and similar pieces of 

 meat left in the water during the same period ; in one of 

 them which had the meat protruding somewhat from each 

 end of the quill, there was a maceration of the protruded 

 ends, which looked like a digestive effect ; but on submitting 

 it to the microscope, I found the muscle-fibres not at all 

 disintegrated, the striiTs being as perfect as in any other 

 part, and the maceration obviously of a purely mechanical 

 nature. A similar appearance is presented by meat, after 

 its ejection by the Actiniae : it is pulpy, colourless, but the 

 muscles are not disintegrated. 



Mr R, Q. Couch, of Penzance, was good enough to repeat 

 these experiments for me. " I folded portions of whiting in 

 test papers," he writes, "and gave them to the Actinite. After 

 12 hours the whole was ejected without the jxipers being 

 either broken or discoloured. I placed bits of mackerel in 

 gutta-percha silk, with the same result. Taking other 

 specimens, which I kept fasting for a fortnight, I gave each 

 a portion of the silvery part of a mackerel, measured its 



