Tllli POLY PUS. 
363 
a small excrescence, takes the figure of a small animal, en- 
tirely resembling its parent, furnished with feelers, a mouth, 
and all the apparatus for seizing and digesting its prey. 
This little creature every day becomes larger, like the parent, 
t.o which it continues attached ; it spreads its arms to seize 
upon whatever insect is proper lor aliment, and devours it 
for its own particular benefit ; thus, it is possessed of two 
sources of nourishment, that which it receives from the pa- 
rent by the tail, and that which it receives from its own in- 
dustry by the mouth. '\ he food which these animals receive 
often tinctures the whole body ; and upon this occasion the 
parent is often seen communicating a part of its own fluids 
to that of its progeny that grows upon it; while, on the 
the contrary, it never receives any tincture from any sub- 
stance that is caught and swallowed by its young. If the 
parent swallows a red worm, which gives a tincture to all 
its fluids, the young one partakes of the paternal colour; 
but if the latter should seize upon the same prey, the parent 
polypus is no way benefited by the capture, but all the ad- 
vantage remains with the young one. 
But we are not to suppose that the parent is capable of 
producing only one at a time; several young ones are thus 
seen at once, of different sizes, growing from its body ; some 
just budding forth, others acquiring their perfect form, and 
others come to sufficient maturity, and just ready to drop 
from the original stem, to which they had been attached for 
several days. But what is more extraordinary still, those 
young ones themselves that continue attached to their parent, 
are seen to burgeon and propagate their young ones also, 
each holding the same dependence upon its respective pa- 
rent, and possessed of the same advantages that have been 
already described in the first connection. 
This seems to be the most natural way by which these 
insects are multiplied ; their production from the egg being 
not so common ; and though some of this kind are found 
with a little bladder attached to their bodies, which is sup- 
posed to be filled with eggs, which afterwards come to ma- 
turity, yet the artificial method of propagating these animals 
is much more expeditious, and equally certain ; it is indiffer- 
ent whether one of them be cut into ten, or ten hundred parts, 
each becomes as perfect an animal as that which was origi- 
nally divided ; but it must be observed, that the smaller the 
part which is thus separated from the rest, the longer it will 
be in coming to maturity, or in assuming its perfect form. 
Besides these kinds mentioned by Mr. Trembley, there are 
various others, which have been lately discovered by the 
