194 Of the frejk Water Polype. 
Young polypes fhoot in proportion to the warmth of 
the weather, and quantity of food the mother eats; 
fome have been perfectly formed in twenty-four hours, 
and others not till the end of fifteen days. The firft 
j 
fhot forth in the midft of fummer, and the other in a fea- 
fon when the water in which the polype was contained, 
made Farenheidt’s thermometer defcend to forty-eight 
degrees. 
They fhoot forth from the fide of their parent as a 
branch from the trunk of a tree; and the excrefcence 
which is the beginning of a polype, is nothing but a con¬ 
tinuation of the fkin of its mother, which is fwelled 
and raifed, nay even forms a tube communicating with 
its mother’s ftomach, as appears from the following ex¬ 
periment j for on choofing a large polype of the fecond 
fort, with a young one at its fide, which being placed 
upon a flip of paper in a little water, the middle of the 
young one’s body was cut, and the fuperior end of that 
part which remained to the mother was then open; next 
cutting the mother on both fides of the young fhoot, it 
became a very fhort portion of a cylinder open at both 
ends, which being viewed through the fuperior and open 
end of the polype, the light was fenfibly feen in the fto¬ 
mach of the mother; but leaft there might yet be a fkin, 
which giving paftage to the light, might neverthelefs fe- 
parate the two ftomachs, the remaining cylindrical por¬ 
tion of the mother was cut lengthwife, and the two 
oppofite parts to that from whence the young one came 
out, were opened; and on obferving it with a micro- 
fcope, not only the hole t, of communication, fig. 391, 
was diftinftly feen, but one might fee quite through the 
end o, of the remaining portion of the young one : af¬ 
terwards changing the fituation of thefe two pieces of 
prepared polypes, and looking through the laft opening 
