AQUATIC PLANTS USEFUL TO THE MICROSCOPIST. 49 



sharp, and brittle. They are hollow, too, and their 

 surface is roughened by minute elevations, as though 

 fairy fingers had sprinkled them with crystal grains. I 

 never see a white water-lily, without in imagination 

 seeing those long stalks rising out of the black mud up 

 through the dark water, with their entire length il- 

 lumined by the sparkling of these internal star-like 

 gems. The whole plant contains them, even the root. 

 The common "spatter-dock" — hideous name! — the 

 Niiphar^ also conceals similar stellate hairs within its 

 stems, but they are there larger and coarser, as be- 

 comes a coarser plant. The leaves of the Ntiphar, 

 however, are not a good microscopical hunting-ground 

 as they usually stand high above the water. 



MYRIOPHYLLUM (Fig. 8). 



This is not rare in shallow ponds and slow streams; 

 it even occurs in running water, but there it is not 



worth gathering, so faras 

 any adherent microscop- 

 ical life is concerned. 

 Indeed, no running water 

 is a good locality for 

 free.-swimming creatures, 

 because ' the current 

 sweeps them away, and 

 so scatters them that it 

 is not possible to make a 

 collection. But where 

 Myriophyllum grows it 



Fig. 8.-Whorl of Myriophyllum Leaves, ^gually grOWS abundant- 

 ly. It forms long green streamers, cylindrical and thick, 

 sometimes more than an inch in diameter and several 



