A. Division of a simple cell into two, each primordial vesicle having developed a cellulose envelope; B. Zoospores, having escaped from a cell; C. Division of an encysted cell into segments; D. Division of another cell, with vibratile flagella projecting through cell-wall; E. An encysted flagellate cell; F. Division of an encysted nucleated cell into four parts, with vibratile filaments projecting; G. Fission of a young cell.
The most striking of the vital phenomena presented by Protococcus is that of periodicity. Certain forms—for instance, encysted zoospores, of a certain colour, appear in a given infusion, at first exclusively, then they gradually diminish, become more and more rare, and finally disappear altogether. After some time their number again increases, and this may be repeated. Thus, a cell which at one time presented only still forms at another contained only motile ones. The same may be said with respect to segmentation. If a number of motile cells be transferred from a larger vessel into a smaller one, in the course of a few hours most of them will have subsided to the bottom, and in the course of the day observed to be on the point of sub-division. On the following morning division will have become completed; on the next day the bottom of the vessel will be found covered with a new generation of self-dividing cells, which, again, will produce another generation. This regularity, however, is not always observed. The influence of every change in the external conditions of life upon the plant is very remarkable. It is only necessary to pour water from a smaller into a larger or shallower vessel to at once induce segmentation of cells. The same phenomenon occurs in other algals; thus Vaucheria almost always develops zoospores at whatever time of year they may be brought from their natural habitat into a warm room. Light is conducive to the manifestation of vital action in the motile spores; they usually collect in great numbers on the surface of the water, and at that part exposed to the strongest light.
But in the act of propagation, on the contrary, and when about to pass into the still condition, the motile Protococcus cell seems to shun light, and falls to the bottom of the vessel. Too strong sunlight, as when concentrated by a lens, quickly kills the young zoospores. A temperature of undue elevation is injurious to the development of their vital activity and the formation of the zoospores. Frost destroys motile, but not still zoospores.[55]
Stephanosphæra pluvialis is a conspicuous variety of the fresh-water algals, described by Cohn. It consists of a cell containing eight primordial cells filled with chlorophyll, uniformly arranged (see [Plate I]., No. 24 d). The globular mother-cell rotates, somewhat in the same way as the volvox, by vibratile flagella, two of which are seen projecting from each cell and piercing the transparent outer cell wall. Every cell divides first into two, then four, and lastly eight cells, each one of which again divides into a number of micro-gonidia, which have a motion within the mother-cell, and ultimately escape from it. Under certain circumstances each of the eight young cells is observed to change places in the interior of the cell; eventually they escape, lose their flagella, form a thicker membrane as at b, and for a time remain motionless, and sink to the bottom of the vessel in which they are contained. If the vessel is permitted to become thoroughly dry, and then again has water poured into it, motile cells reappear; from which circumstance it is probable that these represent the resting spores of the plant. When in the condition of greatest activity its division into eight is perfected during the night, and early in the morning light the young cells escape and pass through similar changes. It is calculated that in eight days, under favourable circumstances, 16,777,216 families may be formed from one resting-cell of Stephanosphæra. In certain of the cells, and at particular periods, remarkable amœboid bodies ([Plate I]., No. 24 c) make their appearance. There is a marked difference between Stephanosphæra and Chlamydococcus, for while in the latter the individual portions of a primordial cell separate entirely from one another, each developing its own enveloping membrane, and ultimately escaping as a unicellular individual; in the former, on the other hand, the eight portions remain for a time living in companionship.
Volvocineæ.—A fresh-water unicellular plant of singular beauty and interest to the microscopist is the Volvox globator ([Plate I]., No. 15). No. 16 represents a portion of another cell, with brownish amœboid bodies enclosed in the protoplasmic web. It is common to our fresh-water pools, and attains a diameter of about 1⁄20th or 1⁄30th of an inch. Its movement is peculiar, a continued roll onwards, or a rotation like that of a top; at other times it glides along smoothly. When examined under a sufficiently high power, it is seen to be a hollow sphere, studded with green spots, and traversed by green threads connecting each of the spots or spores with the maternal cell. From each of the spores proceed two long flagella, lashing filaments, which keep the globular body on the move. After a time the sphere bursts, and the contained sporules issue forth and speedily pass through a similar stage of development. These interesting cells were long taken to be animal bodies. Ehrenberg described them as Monads, possessing a mouth, stomach, and an eye.
The setting free of the young volvox is essentially a process of cell division, occurring during the warmer periods of the year, and, as Professor Cohn shows, is a considerable advance upon the simpler conjugation of two smaller cells in desmids; it more closely resembles that which prevails among the higher algæ and a large number of cryptogams. As autumn advances the volvox spherules usually cease to multiply by the formation of zoosporanges, and certain of their ordinary cells begin to undergo changes by which they are converted, some into male or sperm-cells, others into germ-cells, but the greater number appear to remain sterile. Both kinds of cells at first so nearly resemble each other that it is only when the sperm cells begin to undergo sub-division that they are seen to be about three times the size of the sterile cells. Then the primary cell resolves itself into a cluster of peculiar secondary cells, each consisting of an elongated body containing an orange-coloured endochrome and a pair of long flagella, as seen in the antherozoids of the higher cryptogams. As the sperm-cells approach maturity the clusters may be seen to move within them; the bundles then separate and show an independent active movement while still within the cavity of the primary cell, and finally escape through a rupture in the cell-wall, rapidly diffusing themselves as they pass through the cavity. The germ-cells continue to increase in size without undergoing sub-division, at first showing large vacuoles in their protoplasm, but subsequently becoming filled with a darker coloured endochrome. The form of the cell also changes from its flask-like shape to the globular, and at the same time seems to acquire a firmer envelope. Over this the swarming antherozoids diffuse themselves and penetrate the substance to the interior, and are then lost to view. The product of this fusion, Cohn tells us, is a reproductive cell, or “oospore,” which speedily becomes enveloped in another membrane with a thicker external coat, beset with conical-pointed processes; and now the chlorophyll of the young cell gives place, as in Palmoglæ, to starch and reddish or orange-coloured, and a more highly refractive, fluid. As many as forty of such oospores have been counted in a single sphere of volvox, which then acquires the peculiar appearance observed by Ehrenberg, and described by him under the name of Volvox stellatus. The further history of this wonderful spheroid unicellular plant has been traced out by Kirchner, who found that their germination commences in the early months of the year—in February—with the liberation of the spherical endospore from its envelope and its division into four cells. A remarkable phenomenon has been observed by Dr. Braxton Hicks—the conversion of an ordinary volvox cell into a moving mass of protoplasm that bears a striking resemblance to the well-known amœba. “Towards the end of the autumn the endochrome mass of the volvox increases to nearly double its ordinary size, but instead of undergoing the usual sub-division so as to produce a macrogonidium, it loses its colour and regularity of form, and becomes an irregular mass of colourless protoplasm, containing a number of brownish granules.” The final change and the ultimate destination of these curious amœboid bodies have not been satisfactorily made out, but from other observations on the protoplasmic contents of the cells of the roots of mosses, which in the course of two hours become changed into ciliated bodies, it is believed that this is the mode in which these fragile structures are enabled to retain life and to resist all the external conditions, such as damp, dryness, and the alternations of heat and cold.
It would be quite impossible to deny the great similarity there is between the structure of volvox and that of the motile cell of Protococcus pluvialis. The influence of reagents will sometimes cause the connecting processes of the young cells, as in Protococcus, to be drawn back into the central mass, and the connecting threads are sometimes seen as double lines, or tubular prolongations of the membrane. At other times they appear to be connected by star-like prolongations to the parent cell ([Plate I]., No. 15), presenting an almost identical appearance with Pediastrum pertusum. Another body designated by Ehrenberg Sphærosira volvox is an ordinary volvox in a different stage of development; its only features of dissimilarity being that a large proportion of the green cells, instead of being single, are double or quadruple, and that the groups of flagellate cells form by their aggregation discoid bodies, each furnished with a single flagellum. These clusters separate themselves from the parent cell, and swim off freely under the forms which have been designated Uvella and Syncrypta by Ehrenberg. Mr. Henry Carter, F.R.S., who made a careful investigation of unicellular plants, described Sphærosira as the male, or spermatic form of volvox.
Among other organisms closely allied to volvox and included in Volvocineæ, affording the microscopist many interesting transitional forms in their various modes of fructification, are the Eudorina, still-water organisms that pass through a similar process of reproduction as the volvox. In the Pandorina morum, its reproduction is curiously intermediate between the lower and the higher types; as within each cell is a mulberry-like mass, composed of cells possessing a definite number of swarm spores, sixteen usually, which rupture the mother cell, and swim off furnished with a pair of flagella. A similar process takes place in some of the Confervaceæ and other fresh-water algæ. The Palmella, again, consist of ([Plate I]., No. 21) minute organisms of very simple structure, which grow either on damp surfaces or in fresh water. The stonework of some of our churches is often seen to be covered with a species of Palmella, that take the form of an indefinite slimy film. The “red snow” of Arctic or Alpine regions, considered to be a species of Protococcus, is frequently placed among Palmella. A more characteristic form of the P. cruenta is the Hæmatococcus sanguinis, the whole mass of which is sub-divided by partitions enclosing a larger or smaller number of cells, which diffuse their granular contents through the gelatinous mass in which their several changes take place. The albuminoid envelope of these masses is seen to contain parasitic growths, which have given rise to some discussion, especially when their filaments are observed to radiate in various directions.
The Oscillariaceæ constitute a genus of Confervaceæ which have always had very great interest for the microscopist in consequence of their very remarkable animal-like movements, and from which they derive their generic name. For more than a century these Bacillaria have excited the curiosity of all observers without any one having derived more than an approximate idea of their remarkable rhythmical movements. The frustule consists of a number of very fine short threads attached together by a gelatinous sheath, in one species all of equal length. Their backward and forward movement is of a most singular character; the only other conferva in which I have seen a motion of a similar kind is the Schizonema. In this species the frustules are packed together in regular series, the front and side views being always in the same direction. These several bodies move along within the filamentous sheath without leaving their respective places. On carefully following the movement, it is seen at first much extended, and then more compressed, while the frustules become more linear in their arrangement, and present a closer resemblance to Bacillaria paradoxa, augmented by the circumstance that the frustules are seen to move in both directions. A frustule of Schizonema can move independently of the sheath, and so will a detached frustule of bacillaria. This peculiar and exceptionally anomalous phenomenon as that of the movements of bacillaria can hardly be confined to a solitary species. The movements of the frustules are much accelerated by warmth and light. The longer filaments of other minute species only slightly exhibit any motion of the kind, but have peculiar undulating motions.
