25° 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



WOODLAND WANDERERS, OR THE 

 MYCETOZOA. 



NOT that our woods and shady coppices are the 

 only haunts of the strange creatures designated 

 above, but these are their homes far excellence. 

 Wherever there are shade and moisture, associated 

 with decaying vegetation, there will these curious 

 and interesting organisms almost certainly exist. To 

 find them is quite another matter, as unless one's 

 attention is directed to them, these singular creatures 

 will probably be overlooked. The appellations, 

 organisms and creatures, are used advisedly, as it is 

 still a moot question amongst scientists, whether they 

 belong to the animal or vegetable kingdom. For years 

 a battle royal has been waged amongst specialists in 

 this department of scientific investigation, as to their 

 position in classification, and it may be assumed 

 that a final judgment has not yet been given. Never- 

 theless every original observer has a right to an 

 opinion, which should be unbiassed, and based upon 

 extended data ; and if one may judge upon the fact 

 that in the mature condition these organisms produce 

 capsules containing spores, it would seem that they 

 should be classed with the vegetable kingdom. 



But this tendency (or shall one call it rage ?) for 

 exact classification, for arranging every known form 

 of life in a linear series, may possibly be carried to an 

 absurd length. For if there be any truth in the 

 assumption that all the creatures that inhabit the 

 earth, have descended from some few primordial 

 forms of life, it will readily be granted that the two 

 great kingdoms of animated nature may touch at 

 numerous points ; that here and there they coalesce 

 or diverge, and that there may be existences that 

 combine some of the features of both. To these we 

 may surely relegate the subjects of this paper. They 

 have at least three well-defined stages of existence, 

 the distributive in the form of minute spores, myriads 

 of which are borne as impalpable dust by the country 

 breezes ; the creeping stage, when for an indefinite 

 period, it may be weeks or months, numbers of these 

 spores, having thrown off their cell-coverings, coalesce, 

 and creep about on decayed leaves or in dead wood ; 

 and the mature stage, in which, having ceased their 

 wanderings, they become sessile, and produce capsules. 

 From this it will be seen that they exhibit the curious 

 phenomena of alternation of generations ; that is, 

 that like does not produce like, but that in a 

 series of phases of existence, the first and third, and 

 the second and fourth are alike. Possibly this may 

 not be regarded by some as an instance of true 

 alternation of generations, but it at least presents close 

 analogies to this phenomenon. 



It is the creeping stage, however, which has the 

 greatest fascination for an observer, as it is both 

 curious and singular. It was only after many months 

 of patient investigation that we were rewarded by 

 the discovery of a mass of this substance. The we 



is not editorial, but covers two personalities, a 

 juvenile enthusiast still in his teens, and the writer, 

 the latter often finding material assistance from the 

 sharp vision of his more youthful coadjutor. On the 

 occasion referred to, we had just reached the edge of 

 an opening in a damp wood ; lying near us was a large 

 trunk of an oak, which, having been felled many years 

 ago, was not only saturated with moisture, but was 

 thoroughly decayed. Overshadowing it were tall 

 fronds of bracken, and straggling sprays of bramble. 

 Running our eyes along its rugged bark, adorned here 

 and there with mosses and fungi, we were gratified to 

 see yellow veins of a substance unlike anything we 

 had before seen. It covered a space over a foot in 

 length and several inches in breadth. It was some- 

 what viscid, distributed in anastomosing veins, some 

 minute, and others a quarter of an inch wide, and 

 sometimes spread out into fan-shaped figures towards 

 the margins of the mass. So slight was its adhesion 

 to the bark, that a worm was seen to crawl between 

 the two ; it was probably one of those worms that 

 affect decayed wood, about which Mr. Hilderic Friend 

 writes so'graphically. We knew almost intuitively 

 that it was what we had so long sought, namely the 

 the plasmodium of a Mycetozoon. The term 

 Plasmodium is that by which the creeping stage of 

 these creatures is designated. Aften carefully exa- 

 mining it, looking at it in every respect, noting its 

 dimensions and general appearance, we took off a 

 portion with plenty of the underlying decayed wood, 

 so as to observe it at home at our leisure. After crawl- 

 ing about the wood for four or five days, the granular 

 contents contracted into small protuberances in the 

 veins ; the following day these changed into minute 

 capsules, which eventually became greyish-white, and 

 filled with dark spores. 



Having thus once found plasmodium, it was 

 singular that one had little difficulty in finding it in 

 other places afterwards. A small specimen of an 

 allied species to the one mentioned above, was 

 attached to a piece of wood that lay in contact with a 

 larger one, but only by a narrow strip about a quarter 

 of an inch wide. The plasmodium used this strip as 

 a bridge, and by a single sinuous vein, nearly the 

 whole of it passed over to the larger piece of wood. 

 After having spread out on its surface and absorbed 

 what food was available, it crept back again to its 

 original position, and eventually formed its fruit. On 

 another occasion a. small quantity of greenish-yellow 

 plasmodium was found attached to the under side of 

 a small rotten branch, and it is expedient to examine 

 the under side of fallen branches, as these creatures 

 appear to avoid light. This was placed under 

 observation for several days, after which it mysteriously 

 disappeared, its former position being marked by slimy 

 tracks. One of us thought it was dead, but the 

 juvenile observer hoped it had only crept into the 

 wood. This was really the case, for after a few days 

 it came out of its concealment, and formed a delicate 



