CELLTJLARES, OR CELLULAR PLANTS. 57 



those which are the most simple, that we meet with the near- 

 est analogies to the animal kingdom. 



65. It is in the algae that the vegetable makes the nearest 

 approach to the animal kingdom. It is amongst these plants 

 that we observe the curious phenomena of zoospores (?u6s liv- 

 ing, and artoga, a spore), movable spores, which enjoy truly an 

 animal life at the moment when they are emitted from the 

 tube which contains them, and afterwards germinate and de- 

 velop into a vegetable, fixed and immovable. In Vauoheria 

 (51), Fig. 18, the production of spores takes place in a cell 

 situated at the extremities of the filaments, which becomes 

 swollen so as to acquire a clavate form, is densely filled with 

 granular matter, and finally bursts at the apex and discharges 

 the spore h. The spores thus emitted are furnished with 

 vibratile appendages resembling cilise (ciKum, an eyelash), 

 which enable them to swim about in the water; and in this 

 state they have been actually figured by Bhrenberg as animal- 

 cula3 ! ! In the course of a few hours, however, after their 

 emission, the cilise are absorbed, the spontaneous movements 

 cease, they become attached to some immovable substance in 



Fig. 23. 



the current, and begin to germinate, elongating and under- 

 going division by septa in the usual manner. In Fig. 23, we 



