MICROBES AND PROTISTA. 5 



the English and German languages. In order to in- 

 dicate the organisms which produce diseases, they 

 make use of the word Bacteria, which is only the 

 name of one of the peculiar species assigned to this 

 group, and the one with which we have been longest 

 acquainted. In this case, the name is generalized and 

 applied to an entire group. 



The Italian authors who have been recently occu- 

 pied with the study of microbes have on their part 

 adopted the name Protista, proposed by Hseckel, and 

 of which the sense, although not the etymology, is 

 almost the same as that of the word microbe. 



In reply to the question whether there is any real 

 advantage in establishing an intermediate kingdom 

 of Protista between the two organic kingdoms of 

 animals and plants, we must answer in the negative. 

 This third organic kingdom only serves to render 

 the structure of our modern classification more com- 

 plex ; and it includes, as may be seen from the list 

 given above, a collection of very heterogeneous groups, 

 which it would be more simple to leave in one or the 

 other kingdom. We should, in our opinion, approxi- 

 mate more closely to Nature's plan by only admitting 

 two great kingdoms : the organic kingdom, which 

 includes plants and animals ; and the inorganic king- 

 dom of minerals. The organic kingdom should then 

 be divided into two sub-kingdoms, animals and 

 plants, of which microbes or protista, or whatever 

 else they may be called, should form the connecting 



