﻿Notes upon a Hajjlosporidian. 



183 



older nodules may sometimes assume very large proportions 

 several millimetres in diameter, and encroach very seriously 

 upon the tissue of the liver. The number of parasites in 

 such a nodule is difficult to estimate, but must embrace 

 many hundreds. It is to be noted that the young parasites 

 are very usually found lying together in groups, sometimes 

 comprising very large numbers. 



Fig. 11 represents a parasite which has broken up 

 immediately upon issuing from the capsule, — multiplication 

 of the nuclei and growth seem already to have begun. 



The other path taken by the parasite upon issuing from 

 the cyst is as follows : — The parasite as soon as it has burst 

 the cyst begins to grow (Fig. 13) actively, and increases 

 enormously in size, — it may become as much as a millimetre 

 or more in length. It coils itself in the shape of an 

 irregular worm through the nodule, and may even go 

 outside it into the tissue of the liver, though this is not 

 very often seen. It may branch, and may also apparently 

 break up by plasmotomy into irregular masses of various 

 sizes. Sometimes parts of this complex mass of protoplasm 

 secrete an envelope, but it is not often continuous over 

 the whole creature, especially not in the case of the 

 larger individuals. The form of animal in this stage seems 

 strongly to suggest that it might be capable of amoeboid 

 movement, but this is merely a deduction from its appear- 

 ance, as I have never seen this form alive. The ultimate 

 fate of this creature is obscure. It appears to me, from 

 the material studied, that the masses derived from it by 

 fission round themselves off, secrete an envelope, and 

 proceed with their growth. This would account for the 

 varying relation between the size of the parasite and the 

 thickness of the cyst-wall. It may possibly be that some 

 of these large irregular individuals break up ultimately 

 into small reproductive bodies, as described above. One 

 is led to suspect this from the fact that sometimes many 

 hundreds of small individuals may be seen lying in close 

 apposition to each other, suggesting that they have arisen 

 from the breaking up of a very large individual, or from 

 the simultaneous breaking up of several smaller creatures. 



