

Ixxiv 



TJ/B BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



of Professor Hartig ^. The spermatozoids or phytozoa from 

 the antherida of these plants first assume the forms of 

 Ehrenberg's genera. Spirillum^ and Vibrio, They do not 

 last long, since after forty-eight hours all of them are seen 

 to have become disarticulated. The whole drop of water in 

 which they float is then rendered turbid by numberless 

 actively-moving globules, similar to Monas crepusculum, 

 which, according to Professor Hartig, are always de- 

 veloped from the broken-up fragments of the Spirilla and 

 Vibriones. But after forty-eight hours 'groups of several 

 hundred may frequently be seen in which the primary active 

 motion has ceased. Shortly afterwards, a sharply-defined 

 hyaline skin is formed round these groups, and as it would 

 seem, by the amalgamation or conjunction of the exterior 

 molecules. By this means the young Amoeba {Proleus) is 

 formed. This transformation takes place pretty regularly 

 towards the end of the third day. The original size of the 

 Amoeba is -g-^-o" ii^ diameter.' In the course of three or four 

 days it increases in size, and its movements are very slow. 

 It possesses a vesicle in the posterior part of its body, and 

 resembles the A?noeba princeps of Ehrenberg. The further 

 changes are thus described: — 'After four or five days the 

 A?noeba assumes a spherical shape, and becomes motionless, 

 the vesicular body expanding and contracting rapidly as 

 before, in a manner similar to what takes place in many 

 VorlicellcE, These spherical motionless Amoeb(2 are then, 

 for the most part, united by a mucilage into groups of from 



ten to twenty. 



• • 



In about a fortnight after the com 



mencement of the experiment a green point appears in the 

 interior of the spherical colourless Amoeba ; this point 

 gradually increases in size till it fills up the entire hollow of 

 the Amoeba, and, after becoming covered with a cuticle, it 



. ^ See Translation in ' Journ. of Microsc. Science,' 1855, p. 5^ 



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