116 
than vegetable, but was chiefly grounded on the motion and 
sensitiveness of these organisms. 
As on the one hand the phenomenon of motion seems 
to indicate a definite will, so on the other hand the power 
seems to indicate a distinct sensitiveness ; and finally some 
would attribute to these living lumps of jelly a true soul or a 
so-called spirit, just as they do to men and other true animals. 
In these respects, too, our Protomyxa is allied to the true 
Rhizopoda, and shows particularly the same appearances of 
sensitiveness which I have described in one place in the 
Radiolaria (1. c. p. 128), in another place in Protogenes pri- 
mordialis (1. c. p. 362). This “ organic intelligence ” of the 
Protomyxa shows itself chiefly and principally in this : that 
every foreign body which touches its surfaces, especially a 
moved or self-moving body, produces an increased flow of 
sarcode to the touched and “ sensitive ” part of the body. 
In taking food this Avas plainly to be seen. But if I care- 
fully touched the Protomyxa under the dissecting micro- 
scope with a very fine needle, this irritation also immediately 
induced a strong flow of sarcode ; and the needle point AA r as 
regularly surrounded Avith it. But as soon as I tried to 
pierce the interior of the sarcode body with the needle, and 
moved it forcibly backAvards and forwards, all the pseudo- 
pods were retracted, and the Avhole sarcode body contracted 
itself into a shapeless lump. As a similar or like “ sensi- 
tiveness ” is a quality universally present throughout all 
organic protoplasm, and is recognised in like manner in 
animals, protozoa, and plants, it naturally proves as little 
for the animal nature of the Protomyxa as for that of the 
true Rhizopoda and other Protozoa. The Protomyxa is, on 
the grounds of this sensitiveness, just as little^of an animal as 
the sensitive Mimosa. 
In the course of these experiments on sensitiveness I tore 
several specimens of Protomyxa to pieces, one into tAvo nearly 
equal halves, a second into three, and a third specimen into 
five rather unequal large pieces. Each of these pieces imme- 
diately shrunk together into an irregular, roundish, sarcode 
lump, which at first lay motionless for some time ; but it 
soon began to expand into a flat disc, and to extend small, 
stumpy projections here and there from the periphery; 
these became slowly longer and longer, began to branch 
out dichotomosely, and to form anastomoses Avith their tAA'igs, 
and the entire plasma net was soon again reneAved as if 
nothing had happened. Each of the artificially produced 
fragments moved about as spontaneously and livelily as the 
undivided Protomyxa. The artificial divisibility of the 
