90 THE EVOLUTION OF CONTINUITY 



suggested. The megazooidal plan is clearly based on 

 ancestral zooidal repetition (Fig. 26). 



The Sea-anemone is an Individual. It represents all the 

 (realisable) product of the fertilised ovum, and does not 

 produce other megazooids by gemmation or fission, and the 

 theory we have to offer is that the organism represents the 

 compression in lateral Continuity, in past ages, and during 

 development, of some primitive Continuously Zooidal Indi- 

 vidual type. That Environment in certain of its most 

 powerful aspects has all along striven to compress serial 

 into lateral Continuity is perfectly clear, and in later 



Fig. 26. — Diagram explaining the repetition of the sexual 

 organs of the Sea- anemone. A, cross-section of a ring of 

 zooids compressed round a centra' stem ; the section passing 

 through the reproductive organs of the zooids, which are pre- 

 sumed to be formed at a constant spot on the internal walls. 

 On the supposition that the contiguous walls of the surround- 

 ing zooids have gone to form the septa of the anemone-mega- 

 zooid, we can see how a result such as pictured in b could 

 take place, the sexual organs appearing on the free edges of 

 the mesenteries. 



chapters we shall try to show what these aspects are. But 

 from an examination of its structure, alone, we can hardly 

 doubt that the Sea-anemone has been derived from a 

 Continuously Zooidal ancestry. 



The anemonoid megazooid has not been a milestone on 

 the road which passed on to the highest vertebrates. It 

 represents a divergence from the main road, and one which 

 came to a sudden stop. On the other hand, the megazooid 

 of medusa type, about to be considered, has a structural 

 plan which must closely resemble that of the primitive 



