SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 46. 



tissues the bioplast moves round and round 

 the cell cavitj^, tlius forming concentric 

 fibres or layers. Such bioplasts, evenlj- dis- 

 tributed through all the tissues and organs 

 of the bodj', even in the solid bone, take 

 part in the formation of the tissue around, 

 mLay exist through life and change very 

 slowly in health, most of them getting 

 smaller as age advances. These are instru- 

 mental in establishing the passage of fluid 

 to and fro in the interstices of the tissue. 

 By this continual flow the integrity of the 

 tissue is preserved and the occurrence of 

 degeneration is prevented or postponed. 

 Anything favoring the passage of more nu- 

 trient fluid than the very small quantity 

 required by these slowly living particles fa- 

 vors their enlargement they live too fast. 

 They increase in size, and this change is 

 constant in everj^ form of inflammation and 

 fever. With the enlargement there is invari- 

 ably rise in temperature of the surrounding 

 part and of the blood as it traverses the 

 nearest capillaries. When this change, as 

 in fever, affects the bioplasts of manjr tis- 

 sues of the body and is widely disti-ibuted, 

 the temiDerature of the whole volume of. 

 blood is, as Ave know, raised several de- 

 grees, but falls with the diminution of the 

 febrile symptoms, as the bioplasts return 

 to their ordinary condition. If in ordinary 

 inflammation the process continues and in- 

 creases, the bioplasts give off diverticula 

 which maj' be detached, and at last ' pus 

 corpuscles ' result, and the adjacent struc- 

 tures are destroyed. In all pathological 

 changes these bioplasts take part. The 

 health of the body depends vipon the nor- 

 mal state of the bioplasts, and movement 

 and changes continue while life lasts. 

 Their life is destroyed by many poisons, 

 notably by hydrocyanic acid, the propor- 

 tion of 1 in 100,000 in the blood being pi'ob- 

 ablj' sufficient to destroy the life of adja- 

 cent bioplasts in a few seconds. You must 

 have seen multitudes of these bioplasts 



disseminated through the tissues which 

 you have examined, and have, no doubt, 

 studied their arrangement in difi'erent 

 tissues and organs, though, perhaps, from 

 their being perfectly colorless you may 

 not have regarded them as the most neces- 

 sary part of the organism. Without them, 

 no tissue or organ could have been formed, 

 could have preserved its integrity, or, in 

 case of injur}^ could have been repaired. 

 They are the life of the body, and without 

 them nothing can live ; they constitute the 

 living part of the body — that is, the matter 

 that dies. In cases of fever and inflam- 

 mation, and in various conditions in which 

 there is increased flow and facilitated access 

 to the bioplasm of nuti'ient matter in any 

 tissue or organ, one sees, after the altered 

 state has lasted for a short time, arising 

 here and there in various parts of the bio- 

 plasm minute dots, which gradually become 

 large enough to be seen easily and are 

 known as nuclei. If the process continues 

 some of them become much larger, and in 

 them new points appear (nucleoli). This 

 is an example of true evolution, as the 

 bodies in question are new centers of living 

 matter, which arise in already existing and 

 perfectly structureless bioplasm. 



Not onljr as long as life lasts is the sub- 

 stance of which living matter is composed 

 in constant movement and portions caused 

 to change in position, but the very elements 

 of the matter, however strongly they may 

 have been united in the non-living condi- 

 tion, are caused to separate, and not only 

 are they rearranged, but they are rear- 

 ranged in a definite and predetermined 

 manner which differs in different organ- 

 isms and in different tissues and organs of 

 the same organism. Such movements, of 

 course, can only be represented to the 

 mind, since the movement spoken of and 

 the affected particles themselves are far be- 

 yond the j)resent range of our vision, as- 

 sisted as it may be to the utmost with the 



