some decisive evidence is adduced; but time held by the tentacle of the on the question of the paralysing hydra; and after intently watching power said to reside in the ten- them, saw them at last swim away tacles, these experiments surely de- again lively as before. I removed a termine a negative. In spite of hydra from the phial, in a little the beetle, so completely vanquished, water, and placing it on a slip of there is the evidence of two crabs glass, allowed it to settle and expand and a shrimp being in repeated con- there for two hours, when I added tact with the tentacles, and in nowise several water-fleas (Cypride) to the affected. little pond, and patiently watched While preparing these notes for the them swimming to and fro. Repress, I have been led to extend the peatedly they touched the tentacles experiments; because, although it in their course, but were not hurt, would by no means necessarily fol- were not arrested. At length one low that whatever was true of the was caught, and held for hydroid polypes must also be true of seconds; it then fell to the bottom, the anemones, yet a very plausible and remained motionless for at least suspicion might arise. and did in two minutes, after which it started deed arise in my mind-throwing up, and was off as if its course had doubt on results which were in never been arrested, Now came the contradiction to what was reported test. With a needle I gently arrested of the fresh-water polypes. Read one of these water-fleas; it suddenly this passage from the last edition of sank motionless, remained thus for Owen's Lectures, bearing the date more than a minute, and then darted 1855: "That the tentacula have the off again. Thrice I repeated this power of communicating some be- act, and each time with similar numbing or noxious influence to the result. Will any one say the needle living animals which constitute the had a benumbing poison which was food of the hydra, is evident from secreted when the animal came in the effect produced, for example, contact with it? And does not the upon an entomostracan, which may reader at once recognise in this sudhave been touched, but not seized, by den motionlessness of the animal a one of these organs. The little active very familar phenomenon? The spider, crustacean is arrested in the midst of the crab, the oniscus, and very many its rapid darting motion, and sinks animals "sham dead," as schoolapparently lifeless for some distance; boys know, when danger threatens; then slowly recovers itself, and re- these water-fleas "sham dead" when sumes its ordinary movements. Sie- the polype or the needle touches bold states, that when a Naïs, a Daphnia, or the larva of a Cheironomus, have been wounded by the darts, they do not recover, but die. These and other active inhabitants of fresh waters, whose powers should be equivalent to rend asunder the delicate gelatinous arms of their low-organised captor, seem paralysed almost immediately after they have been seized, and so countenance the opinion of Corda, that the secretion "paste-eels" for some time in conof a poison enters the wounds." Such statements can only be set aside by direct experiment; and the superiority of experiment over mere observation needs no argument. As a matter of observation, I too had been struck with the fact noticed by Owen. I saw the tiny water-fleas drop apparently lifeless to the bottom of the phial, after being some them. I might have rested my incredulity of the alleged paralysing influence on this one experiment; but I confirmed it in other ways. Dropping the larva of an ephemeron into the phial containing my hydræ, I observed it thrice caught by three different hydra; it did not "sham dead," but tore itself away without visible hurt. Nay, I also observed one of those animalcules known as tact with the tentacle of a hydra, on the stage of the microscope, but, in spite of its having no shell to protect it from the poison, it was unhurt by the contact. Not having a Naïs, I could not test what Siebold says of it; but what has already been mentioned must, I think, suffice to convince the reader that the current opinion is an error, founded on observation unverified by experiment. Had I trusted to observation alone, I too should have believed the current opinion; it was only by verification, according to the demands of inductive scepticism, that the error became obvious.* "But do tell us something about the habits and instincts of these anemones," some light-minded reader suggests, impatient of all discussion, and supremely indifferent to all considerations, save those of a moral order. Unhappily my story is not ampler in detail, nor finer in complexity of movement, than the story of Canning's Knife-grinder"-who had none to tell. The anemone is lovely, but even its warmest admirers must confess it is a little monotonous in its manifestations. Existence suffices it. It expands its coronal of tentacles, eats when chance favours it, produces offspring, which it sends forth, leaving it, πολλοις διαύλοις κυματων φορουμενος, borne by the many currents of the sea, to settle where it lists, without any fear of parental supervision, and thus lives to a good old age, if no one nudges the elbow of Atropos, and causes that grim lady suddenly to cut the thread. The anemone has little more than beauty to recommend it; the indications of intelligence being of by no means a powerful order. What then? Is beauty nothing? Is it not the subtle charm which draws us from the side of the enlightened Miss Crosser to that of the lovely though "quite unintellectual" Caroline, whose conversation, indeed, is not of a novel or brilliant kind; whereas Miss Crosser has read a whole Encyclopædia, and is so obliging as to retail many pages of it freely in her conversation. Besides, if the monotony of the anemone wearies you, there is always this variety in reserve: you can eat it! The Italians do; they boil it in seawater with great satisfaction. Thus boiled, it has "a shivering texture, somewhat like calf's-foot jelly; the smell is somewhat like that of a warm crab or lobster," and it is caten with savoury sauce. Mr. Gosse describes his frying them in butter, if I remember rightly; and although he felt a little difficulty in swallowing the first mouthful-probably remorse and zoological tenderness gave him what the Italians call a "knot in the throat"-yet, having vanquished his scruples, he ate with some relish. Lady Jane is "horrified" at the idea of eating her pets; but now that horse-flesh is publicly sold in the markets of Vienna and other German towns, and public banquets of hippophagists are frequent in France, will anemones escape the frying-pan? It was hinted just now that the anemone was but an indifferent parent. Having given birth to her offspring, she spends no anxious hours over the episodes of infancy. When I say She, I might as well say He, or It, for no distinction of sex exists; and probably it is to this cause that the parental indifference may be traced; how can maternal tenderness and ceaseless vigilance be expected, when the maternal individual is as yet undeveloped? The Actinia are viviparous. Indeed I suspect they are only viviparous, and not at all oviparous. Rymer Jones The day this was written I could not rest till I had dredged a favourite pond and brought home a supply of Naïds, with which, on the following morning, I tested Siebold's statement. First I placed a Naïs filiformis in a glass cell with a Hydra viridis; but although its wriggling constantly brought it into contact with the tentacles, it was never grasped. I then placed a Naïs in the phial containing many hydra; it was instantly caught by one, and held for some time till it struggled itself free. Not only was it apparently unhurt by this contact, but to-day it is as lively as it was three days ago, just before the experiment. With two other Naïds the same result was observed. This completes the overthrow of the current opinion respecting the hydra's paralysing power. The age to which an Actinia may live has not yet been definitely ascertained; but Mr. Tugwell communicates in a note that Professor Fleming at Edinburgh has one in his possession, which was taken at North Berwick in 1828; so that, at the very least, it must be twenty-eight years old, that period having been passed in confinement. seems to hesitate on the point, adding, “but it is asserted by numerous authorities that the young are not unfrequently born alive. I not only assert this, but ask whether any one has ever seen the contrary. It startled me, however, when, on opening an anemone, I for the first time saw a young one drop out, and immediately expand its tentacles; and some days afterwards, as I was carrying home a lovely "gem," I saw first one, then two, three, four, seven young ones issue from its mouth, fix themselves at the bottom of the vase, and make themselves at home; they were of various sizes, and in various stages of development. Since then, I have repeatedly witnessed this mode of birth and one day, seeing something in the inside of the tentacle of a Daisy, I snipped the tentacle off, and found a young daisy there. Some writers imagine that the young issue through the orifices at the tips of the tentacles -a supposition not very credible. The truth is, that at the bottom of the stomach there is a large opening -not several minute openings as we see figured in books-through which the young pass from the general cavity into the water; and this appears to me the only exit for the young. Without absolutely denying that the ova are extruded, and their early development carried on out of the parent's body, I have never been able to detect ova, except within the parent. The most curious of all my observations on this point was the finding in the visceral cavity of a smooth anemone a young one as large as a cherry; and to complete the marvel, it was faintly striped with green, like the well-known*" greenstriped variety," although its parent was of a dark-brown hue. Could the old one have swallowed an errant youth by mistake? No. It had been many weeks in captivity, where no such errant youths were within reach besides, anemones do not swallow each other; cannibalism belongs to a higher grade of development. Apropos of this peculiarity of colour, I may remark on the great variations observable in the colour of anemones, and the impropriety of making colour the distinguishing mark of species. Thus, to select a striking example, Mr. Gosse makes two distinct species of the orangedisked and orange-tentacled anemones, naming them Venusta and Aurora; but as if to prove the indifference of all such characteristics, I brought with me from Tenby an orange-disked-and only one-which, before it had been home a fortnight, I discovered, with great surprise, was changed into an orange-tentacleddisc and tentacles being of a rich orange hue, the only traces of white remaining just at the tips. If there had been any other specimen in the vase I might have doubted; but having only one in company with a white daisy, and a smooth anemone, there was no avoiding the conclusion. The reader was promised "New Facts," and those already furnished will show him how great an accession to our knowledge may be anticipated from the present direction of so many minds towards these animals; what is written in the best books must be accepted as only suggestions of a few observers, to be controlled by the investigations of succeeding observers. Many problems await solution; many stereotyped assertions must be disproved. Let us here consider one or two accepted "facts" which will turn out to be "fancies" when rigorously examined. Perhaps nothing has excited more surprise on the part of the public, and nothing has been more unanimously believed by anatomists, than the hypothesis that certain minute organs found in Polypes, and variously styled thread capsules, filiferous capsules, or urticating cells, are organs of urtication, or stinging. The uncritical laxity with which this hypothesis has been accepted may point a lesson. I do not allude to the acceptance of the fact that certain capsules containing threads are found in Polypes, but to the acceptance of the alleged purpose or function of these capsules. The things are there, sure enough; but whether they serve the urticating purpose is another matter. Ever since they were first described by Wagner, * Erdl, Quatrefages, and Siebold, they have passed without challenge. They have been detected in the whole group of Polypes, in Jelly-fishes, in the papillæ of Eolids, and, according to Vander Hoeven, in Planaria; yet, as far as my reading extends, not one single experiment has been made to prove the function so unanimously admitted, not a single test has been applied to strengthen or controvert what was, indeed, very plausible, but only plausible, not proren. Accordingly, no sooner did I submit the question to that rigorous verification which science imperiously requires, than it became clear to me that my illustrious predecessors -Wagner, Erdl, Siebold, Quatrefages, Ehrenberg, Agassiz, and Owen -men whom the most presumptuous would be slow to contradict, had admitted the point without proof, because it wore so plausible an air. Let me hope the reader will accuse me of no immodesty in thus controverting men so eminent; he will see that whereas they have only hypothesis on their side, I have the accumulated and overwhelming weight of experimental evidence. What are these "capsules," or "urticating cells?" The uninstructed reader may be told that the Polypes are supposed to urticate, or sting, like nettles; and the nettling organs, or urticating cells, are supposed to be minute suboval microscopic capsules, quite transparent, containing within them threads coiled up, which, on pressure, dart out to many times the length of the capsule, into which they never return. This thread Agassiz likens to a lasso thrown by the polype to secure its prey. I will not enter here into minute details of structure, which would only confuse the reader, who, if curious, will find all that is known, in the works of Mr Gosse, and the treatises of Owen, Siebold, and Rymer Jones. Any one who has once seen these threads under the microscope darting out with lightning rapidity, especially if he uses a high power, and detects the hooks *WIEGMANN'S Archiv., 1835, ii. p. 215. with which some of them seem to be furnished, will at once admit that the hypothesis of the "nettling" or "urtication" being performed by these threads is an hypothesis so obvious, an explanation so natural, that-it should be doubted. In all complex matters, we should mistrust the obvious explanation; I do not say that we should disregard or reject it, but mistrust it. When we know, on the one hand, that the jelly-fish stings, and when, on the other hand, we know that it is furnished with numerous cells, in which are coiled threads, to be seen darting out when pressed, the idea of connecting the stinging with these threads is inevitable: but this is not enough for science; it is only a preparatory guess, which proves nothing; it may be right, it may be wrong. I believe it is altogether wrong. We have already seen how erroneous was the supposition that Polypes paralysed their victims with a touch; that poison was secreted by their tentacles; yet for this supposition there was at least the evidence of partial observation, whereas, for the supposition we have now to consider, there is absolutely no evidence at all. On a survey of the place where these "urticating cells" are present, we stumble upon an unlucky fact, and one in itself enough to excite suspicion. They are present in a few jelly-fish-which urticate; in actinia which urticate; and in all polypes which, if they do not urticate, are popularly supposed to do so, and at any rate possess some peculiar power of adhesion. In all these cases organ and function may be said to go together. But the cells are also present in the majority of jelly-fish, which do not urticate; in Eolids-which do not urticate; and in Plana.ia-which do not urticate. Here, then, we have the organ without any corresponding function; urticating cells, but no urtication. The cautious mind of Owen had already warned us that there was something not quite satisfactory in our supposition; some super 66 + MULLER'S Archiv., 1841, p. 423. ‡ Comp. Anat., i. p. 39 (English Trans.) addition to the thread-cell would seem to be essential to the urticating faculty," he says, when speaking of the jelly-fish, since these cells are present in species and parts that do not sting." It is to be regretted that he was not moved by this doubt to a closer examination of the evidence on which the urticating faculty rested; he would assuredly have been led to the belief that no superaddition to the thread-cell will account for the phenomenon. But I waive the argument derived from such a source, and, confining myself to the anemones, ask the reader what he thinks of this awkward fact, namely, that these urticating cells are most abundant in parts which do not urticate? Only the tentacles have this power, and although they have numerous cells, the urtication cannot well be attributed to them, since these cells are more abundant in the convoluted bands, in the lining walls of the stomach, and in the blue spots which surround the oral disc in the smooth anemone-these spots, indeed, being made up of such cells and small granules-yet in not one of these parts can the slightest urtication be traced! How is this? If these cells are the nettling organs, why do they not nettle in those parts where they are most abundant? No one has thought of asking this question. It thus appears that animals having the cells, have none of the power attributed to the cells; and that even in those animals which have the power, it is only present in the tentacles, where the cells are much less abundant than in parts not manifesting the power: the conclusion, therefore, presses on us that the power does not depend upon these cells. And this conclusion is strengthened every step we take. Thus the Anthea is of all anemones the most powerfully urticating; yet if we compare its cells with those of other anemones, we find them greatly inferior in quantity to those of the Daisy and Dianthus, and much inferior in size to those of Crassicornis, as well as less easily made to recoil their threads. It has not been remarked, that whereas according to theory the thread should dart out almost instan taneously on the slightest pressure; in point of fact it frequently cannot be pressed out at all, even when the whole force of the finger is exerted on the two pieces of glass between which it lies. From the very capricious way in which the threads dart out while under the microscope, and not under pressure, and from the frequent impossibility of pressing them out, I suspect that pressure has really nothing normally to do with the ejection of the thread. Ilitherto we have merely considered facts of observation; we shall now see them confirmed by experiment. Mr. Gosse proposes to establish a new genus, named Sagartia, on this purely hypothetical function; including in it all those anemones which, like the Daisy and Dianthus, possess an abundance of peculiar white filaments, visible to the naked eye, which are protruded from the pores of the body and the mouth, when the animal is roughly handled. These filaments are seen, on examination, to be chiefly composed of the "urticating cells." Mr. Gosse names the genus Sagartia, because Herodotus says of the Sagartians, that "when they engage with the enemy they throw out ropes which have nooses at the end, and whatever any one catches he drags towards himself, and they that are entangled in the coils are put to death." The name, you perceive, is aptly chosen, that is, it would be, if the hypothesis of the filaments were not a figment. The filaments have no such lasso-like and murderous power. This Mr. Gosse would deny; and I remember he somewhere records an observation which would perhaps quite satisfy him that his denial has good ground to stand on. He relates that he once saw a small fish in the convulsions of agony, with one of these filaments in his mouth; it shortly expired, and he unhesitatingly concludes from this fact that the Sagartia "will attack even vertebrate animals." It is a matter of surprise and regret that Mr. Gosse, having once made such an observation, did not feel the imperative necessity of repeating and varying the fact, so as to be sure that the death was not a mere coincidence. If the filament had the power which this single observation fairly |