Badhamia tttricularis and Brefeldia maxima. 5 
the flow being set up, and as a rule no change whatever 
takes place in the starch-grains ; they are seen to be swept 
over by the streaming currents, or carried along the larger 
veins, and after five or six days’ retention, they may be cast 
out or left behind on the glass with no more visible alteration 
than if they had been grains of sand. 
On one occasion I watched what I supposed at the time 
to be the actual absorption of starch. On May 26, 1887, I 
was observing plasmodium in a glass box on the side of 
which I had spread raw starch scraped from potato. I 
noticed a body having the size and general form of a starch- 
granule, with a slight indentation, and drew it with camera 
lucida (Fig. 16 a); a thin stream of plasmodium was then 
flowing over it. I left the glass box on the stage of the 
microscope, with the drawing below the camera ; after an 
hour’s interval I looked again and found that the object 
had diminished to the size b in Fig. 16; from that time it 
was under constant observation for an hour and a half, 
during which it passed through the forms £, d , e , f, g , 
drawn with the camera at intervals of about a quarter of 
an hour ; the last fragment then disappeared in the film of 
plasmodium which had continued to stream with the regular 
rhythmic alternate flow during the whole of the time. From 
subsequent experience I can hardly suppose this to have 
been a grain of raw starch, for I have since watched hundreds 
of these grains, often for hours without intermission, and in 
no single instance have I been satisfied that any change has 
taken place, nor have I seen any appearance of erosion of 
raw grains left by retreated plasmodium that could not be 
explained by the effect of bruising. 
I have frequently examined raw starch which has remained 
for a week and from that to ten days constantly enveloped 
in moving plasmodium, and not a grain has shown the 
slightest erosion ; yet I give the above observation as possess- 
ing considerable interest as an undoubted instance of the 
absorption of a solid substance. 
If instead of using starch in its raw state, it is first warmed 
