114 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
evidence of an equivalent amount of progress achieved by 
microscopic workers in those new fields for investigation thrown 
open to them by the skill of the optician. With humiliation 
it is, however, necessary to admit that these new and high-class 
magnifying powers, distributed as they now are broadcast through- 
out the land, are destined in the majority of instances to fulfil a 
most unimportant if not ignoble role . Boxed up in the cabinet 
of their possessor, they rarely see the light, except, maybe, for 
the purpose of a more often than otherwise abortive attempt to 
resolve the dots or striae upon the siliceous shell of some obscure 
and vexatious diatom, further weighted or handicapped in many 
instances by immersion in a medium intentionally employed for 
the purpose of rendering previous obscurity still more obscure ; 
or again, perhaps, for an exposition of the owner’s views of the 
nature of the markings upon a Podura scale, or for an attempted 
solution of some occult question of angular aperture. Granted, 
that the accomplishment of such trivial ends, and the emulation 
entertained among amateur microscopists to possess a lens that 
shall outstrip their neighbours’ in the perfection of its defining 
power, has contributed in no small degree towards the highest 
triumphs of the optician in this department, it is still greatly to be 
deplored that so much latent power of discovery should thus lie 
year after year, like the golden talent of tradition, buried in a 
napkin. Surely, among the myriads of minute organisms at the 
base of the animal and vegetable worlds, there is room enough 
and to spare for valuable and even original investigation ! Here, 
indeed, the harvest-field is full to the overflowing, and to any 
entering upon it in a scientific spirit, possessing ordinary dex- 
terity of manipulation and some rudimentary knowledge of the 
forms he is likely to encounter, may be promised a reward far 
more gratifying to himself and more useful to his fellow -workers 
than he can achieve by a lifetime devoted to the solution of the 
markings on a frustule of Surirella gemma or on the scales of 
Lepidocyrtis curvicollis. 6 II n’est que le premier pas qui coute’ 
— and here as elsewhere the chief obstacle experienced by the 
amateur worker, armed with his new high-power objective, and 
ardent to win his spurs as an original discoverer, is beyond doubt 
the selection of a subject. In recognition of this difficulty of 
making a commencement, and also of the assistance and encou- 
ragement that may often be derived from the narration of per- 
sonal experience gained in the striking out of a novel field, a 
brief account will here be given of some of the results of a rather 
successful forage or series of forages conducted by the writer 
during leisure hours within the last few years, in association with 
certain newly discovered or previously little known Flagellate 
Protozoa ; all these forms again, without exception, requiring 
for their satisfactory interpretation the. employment of those 
