294 Lister. — On Chondrio derma difforme 
protoplasm was much more turbid than at the close, when it 
was remarkably hyaline ; the swarm-cell appeared also to 
have increased in size, though this was difficult to determine 
by measurement in consequence of its changing form. No 
rejection of refuse matter took place while the observation 
lasted. 
In the same preparation I watched a swarm-cell creeping in 
a straight line with the strange snail-like movement, so diffi- 
cult to understand. In its course it came to a small group 
of motionless bacilli lying against the glass ; immediately it 
changed its linear form and spread itself out, covering four of 
the bacilli. In about two minutes it resumed its former 
shape and movement and crept away carrying off two of the 
bacilli in vacuoles. 
These observations seem to confirm the opinion of De Bary 
that the organisms under consideration should be classed 
among the animal rather than the vegetable kingdom, which 
led him in 1858 to adopt the term Mycetozoa in place of that 
of Myxomycetes for the group. When a creeping swarm-cell 
is watched, with the projecting cilium placed immediately in 
advance of the nucleus, which never shifts its position, and 
when, as in the last-mentioned case, we note the manner in 
which the vibrating extremity of the cilium appeared to detect 
the presence of the bacilli before the swarm-cell spread itself 
over them ; again, when we observe the creeping action 
suddenly change, and raising itself from the decumbent 
attitude, with a few lashing strokes of the cilium the swarm- 
cell releases its foot-hold and swims away ; and when to these 
remarkable movements is added the process of ingestion which 
has been described ; we cannot but feel the force of the con- 
clusion at which De Bary arrived, if indeed a distinct line of 
demarcation between the two kingdoms can be said to exist. 
Another point of interest which these experiments bring 
out is the variation which occurs in the progeny of a common 
parent when the natural conditions are slightly altered by 
cultivation. 
The calcareous wall of the sporangium may be either closely 
