CHAPTER VI. 



MICROSCOPIC FORMS OF VEGETABLE LIFE. — PROTOPHYTfiS. 



145. In commencing our survey of these wonders and beau- 

 ties of Life and Organization, vs^hich. are revealed to us by the 

 assistance of the Microscope, it seems on every account the most 

 appropriate to turn our attention in the first instance to the 

 Vegetable Kingdom ; and to begin with those humblest mem- 

 bers of that kingdom, whose form and structure, and whose 

 very existence, in many cases, are only known to us through its 

 use. For those who desire to make themselves familiar with 

 microscopic appearances, and to acquire dexterity in microscopic 

 manipulation, cannot do better than educate themselves by the 

 study of those comparatively simple forms of organization, which 

 the Vegetable fabric presents ; since a facility in minute dissec- 

 tion and in microscopic analysis may be thus acquired, which 

 will save much expenditure of time and labor, that might be 

 unprofitably applied, without such apprenticeship, to the attempt 

 to unravel the complexities of Animal organization. But fur- 

 ther, the scientific Histologist (p. 49) looks to the careful study 

 of the structure of the simplest forms of Vegetation, as furnish- 

 ing the key (so to speak) that opens the right entrance to the 

 study of the elementary Organization, not merely of the higher 

 Plants, but of the highest Animals. And in like manner, the 

 scientific Physiologist looks to the complete knowledge of their 

 life history, as furnishing the surest basis for those general no- 

 tions of the nature of Vital Action, which the advance of science 

 has shown to be really well founded, only when they prove 

 equally applicable to both kingdoms. But further, a peculiar 

 interest attaches itself at the present time, to everything which 

 throws light upon the debated question of the boundary between 

 the two kingdoms ; a question which is not less keenly debated 

 among Naturalists, than that of many a disputed frontier has 

 been between adjacent Nations. For many parts of this border 

 country have been taken and retaken several times ; their inha- 

 bitants (so to speak) having first been considered, on account of 

 their general appearance, to belong to the Vegetable Kingdom, — 

 then, in consequence of some movements being observed in them, 

 being claimed by the Zoologists, — then, on the ground of their 



