122 
ON ANIMALCULES. 
magnifying power demonstrates the communication of these globules 
with the exterior; they are besides exceedingly moveable, and change 
their place in every possible way, passing forwards and backwards, 
with the leAst movements of the animalcule in which they are dis¬ 
tinguished, so that if they had any communication with the surface, 
by the minutest tube imaginable, solid but at the same time capillary, 
all these intestines would become knotted in inextricable confusion.” 
“ I am further, as Muller was, very certain that several of the 
larger species swallow others, and again cast them up after retaining 
them for a time in their interior. I have seen some of these very 
small, enter, remain, and issue out from the bodies of the larger spe¬ 
cies, without my having lost sight of them for a single instant, and 
without their appearing to be dead. I have also coloured, not only 
the Microscopica, but those of a still higher order, the hydras, or 
fresh water polypi, and it appeared to me that it was solely the mole¬ 
cule, and never the internal globules, or alledged stomachs which be¬ 
came tinged. An experiment can easily be made in which nature 
seems to be left at liberty, in the spring and autumn, when the green 
matter penetrating the oyster beds, (les pares d’huitres) and the stag¬ 
nant water of the water huts of our suburbs, in which case not only 
the Microscopica become coloured, but the Entromostraca, and the 
oysters. I am quite certain that the species of the genus Oplithal- 
moplanis are not Monads after dinner, and I would as soon take the 
characteristic internal globule for an eye as for a stomach.” 
“ As to eyes, I may add, that if M. Ehrenberg, has really dis¬ 
covered them in many of my genera, particularly in the Megalotro- 
chiae, he must needs remove these genera from the class of Infusoria 
in order to elevate them in the scale of organization, one of the cha¬ 
racters of the class Microscopica, being, according to me, the absence 
of organs for concentrated vision.” 
f ‘ To conclude, amongst all the figures in the work of the German 
Naturalist, which I have now before me, I have not found a single 
species there engraved, that is not met with in the vicinity of Paris. 
Almost all of them indeed have been previously published, a circum¬ 
stance, however, which in no way detracts from the merits of the 
author.” 
I may remark upon these contradictory views of the German and 
the French Naturalist, that M. Bory, de St. Vincent, may from long 
habit, be so prejudiced in favour of the system he has adopted, as to 
prevent him from forming an unbiassed opinion on M. Ehrenberg s 
views. James Rennie. 
Lee, Kent, January, 28th. 1833. 
