THE FUNGOID ORIGIN OF DISEASE, ETC. 815 
When we find that there is no extent to the slowness of 
change and movement in organised matter, that with the 
highest magnifying power possessed we can limit; that even 
unmelted iron is said to flow; when, on the other hand, the 
power of determining the velocity of bodies diminishes with 
the magnifying power, so that distance and magnitude itself 
are required to make us sensible of the rate at which comets 
travel, even if not of the presence of the atoms of matter en 
masse which form their nebulosities, so that neither one nor 
the other could be seen if close to us, any more than electri- 
city or uncondensed steam. 
“ When, 1 repeat, our perceptions in these respects remain 
so finite, how can anyone come forward with the assertion 
that there is such a thing as 1 spontaneous generation/ based 
upon the presence of animalcules which, produced under any 
circumstances, may be, and probably are, far more compli- 
cated in their structure, and therefore higher in the scale of 
organic development than a host of living beings with whose 
forms even we have as yet no means of becoming cognizant ? 
“ Progressive knowledge may lead the human mind to the 
beginning of vitality, to the quickening power of matter and 
its processes, but until this is reached, it seems to me prema- 
ture to assume as a fact that there is such a power as spon- 
taneous generation. 
“ With reference to the next point in your paper, the trans- 
formation of the protoplasm of the vegetable cell into amoe- 
boid forms, who shall limit the extent to which such forms 
may not penetrate into and live passively in the protoplasm 
of both animal and vegetable cells, until a favorable oppor- 
tunity arrives for their future development? I, of course, 
include in the amoeboid forms, the Myxogostres , now called 
by Du Bary ‘ Myxozoa.’ Just before leaving Bombay, I 
found the brown stains in some cotton which was submitted 
to me for microscopical examination, to arise from the deve- 
lopment of a mycelium originating in cells or germs of a 
mycetozoon, which were probably introduced into the cell of 
the cotton fibre when fresh, and which, on the moisture of 
the cotton during exposure to the rainy monsoon finding the 
vitality of its host extinct, naturally appropriated its proto- 
plasm, and produced, while growing, the stains mentioned 
and consequent injury to the staple. 
“ I am glad that we are at one accord as to the origin of 
protozoa in the cells of organised beings. 
“ It appears to me that Dr. Hicks is in the same zone (so 
to write) of investigation in this respect as I was before I 
renounced my opinion of the c fancied’ transformation of the 
