



B 



i 



2l8 



THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



yet all the ordinary vegetative and reproductive pheno- 

 mena go on within the chambers of which they are 

 composed. And if we are still to call these non- 

 nucleated chambers ^ cells/ we nevertheless find similar 

 vegetative and reproductive phenomena taking place 

 within structures which certainly have no right to such 

 a name. It appears that Leptomkus^ Saprolegnia^ Van- 

 cherla^ Codium^ 'Bryopsh^ Caulerpa^ and perhaps other Alg^ 

 as well as Fungi are branched filiform organisms pre- 

 senting no trace of a cellular structure, although by 

 a strange perversion of language they have been spoken 

 of as ^branched unicellular organisms' by those who 

 were anxious to interpret all facts so as to make them 

 yield to the requirements of an exclusively ^cellular' 

 Theory of Organization. At a definite stage in the 

 life of such organisms a partition extends across, near 

 the extremity of certain of the filaments, so as to cut 

 ofF a small terminal chamber. This chamber enlarges 

 rapidly, and . its contents undergo changes such as we 

 have described in Achlya^ speedily leading to the forma- 

 tion of actively moving zoospores. Are such changes 

 due to the properties of the living matter itself, or 

 are they attributable to the mere chamber in which 

 it is enclosed ? Has the growth of the partition sud- 

 denly given rise to a potentiality previously non- 



* 



existent ? Again, when the Frotomyxa contracts, when 

 its living matter devoid of a nucleus condenses ex- 

 ternally, so as to form a cell-wall or cyst, are the 

 phenomena of segmentation which subsequently occur 



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 ' are therek 



^strengthening our 

 (iiitence of mere n. . 



iological basis of J 



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ickow that the eel 



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