826 EVENINGS AT THE MICROSCOPE. 



I have just been exploring some of these rock-wells, 

 and have rifled them of not a few of their living treasures, 

 bringing home the spoils, that you may share with me in 

 the enjoyment of examining them. 



The Zoophytes* are here in their glory. Such places 

 as those I speak of are the very capitals of the zoophytie 

 nation. Look at this great leaf of the fingered Tangle : 

 see how its broad olive-brown expanse is covered with tiny 

 forests of white branching threads, which spread and 

 spread till they run off into the fingers of the much split 

 leaf ; and not only on one side, for the under surface is as 

 densely clad with the shaggy burden as the upper; the 

 smooth leathery tissue being covered with a network of 

 creeping roots, branching and radiating everywhere, like 

 the railways on Bradshaw's map. 



This double forest is wholly composed of a single species, 

 called Laomedea geniculata; nay, I believe it is but one 

 single individual. That is to say, the whole of these mul- 

 titudinous ramified threads and stems, with their innu- 

 merable polypes, f have all extended by gradual though 

 rapid growth from a single germ, and all are connected 

 even now, so that a common life pervades the whole. 

 But we will look awhile at it in detail till we have mastered 

 its external features, and then I will tell you something of 

 its history and economy. 



With the unassisted eye we can discern plainly enough 

 the outline and plan of this compound organism. Along 

 the smooth and slippery surface of the olive weed runs a 



* From the Greek ?<■»» (zoon), an animal, and fyvrbv (phuton), a plant. 

 A term applied to a large class of animals bearing polypes, and whose 

 entire skeleton, called a polypary or polypidom, more or less resembles a 

 plant or tree in its appearance and growth. 



The term Cmlenterata is now substituted for this in systematic natural 

 history. See Prof. Greene's excellent " Manual of the Anim. Kingd." 

 ii. Lond. 1861. 



t From the Greek h-oMps (polus), many, and tfovi (pous), foot. A low 

 order of animals with numerous tentacles or feelers round the aperture 

 serving for a mouth, and often bearing a strong resemblance to flowers. 



