45° . 



Microscopical Essays, 



be found adhering to the large leaves of duck-weed and other 

 aquatic plants. 



The bell, or cafe, which thefe animals inhabit, being very 

 tranfparent, all the motions of it's inhabitants may be difcerned 

 diftinctly through it. There are feveral ramifications, or final ler 

 bells, proceeding from the larger one ; in each of thefe there is 

 an inhabitant. The opening at the top of thefe bells is juft large 

 enough for the creature's head and a fmall part of it's body to be 

 thruft out from it, the reft remaining in the cafe, into which it 

 alfo draws the head on the leaft alarm. 



Befides the particular and feparate motions which each of thefe 

 creatures is able to exert within, it's cafe, and independent of the 

 reft, the whole colony has a power of altering the pofition of the 

 bell, and removing it from one place to another. Thefe animal - 

 cula feem not to like to dwell in focieties whofe number exceeds 

 fifteen ; when the colony happens to increafe in number, the bell 

 may be obferved to fplit gradually, beginning from about the 

 middle of the upper extremity, and proceeding downwards towards 

 the bottom, till they at laft feparate and become two colonies, 

 independent of each other. 



The arms are very near each other ; fixty may often be counted 

 in one plume, having each the figure of an Italic /; one of whofe 

 hooked ends is faftened to the head ; and all together, when ex- 

 panded, compofe a figure fomewhat like a horfefhoe, convex on 

 the fide next the body, but gradually opening and turning out- 

 wards, fo as to leave a confiderable diftance within the outer ex- 

 A tremities 



