“What a curious thing the sea-tulip is,” said she. “Is it a plant, and are there any like it growing now?”
“It is not a plant,” said Mrs. Merton, “but a zoophyte, and I believe it has only been found in a fossil state.”
Fig. 23.
Mass of Fossils containing the Siphonia, or Sea-Tulip.
“Zoophyte!” said Agnes; “that is half a plant, and half an animal, is it not, mamma?”
“The word zoophyte,” returned Mrs. Merton, “signifies literally an animal plant; and it was formerly applied only to those singular creatures which grew in the ground like plants, and were yet furnished with tentacula or arms which they could extend or contract so as to provide themselves with food. But it is now used in a more enlarged sense, and it includes various kinds of polypes, animalcules and other animals of the lowest class. Some of these creatures seem to consist merely of semitransparent jelly, and when disturbed they contract themselves into almost shapeless lumps.”
“Have I ever seen any of these animalcules?” asked Agnes.
“You probably have without being aware of it,” returned her mother: “for in summer when the sun is warm they may generally be seen in ponds and slowly running waters, looking like little lumps of transparent jelly, and hanging to plants or any other object that may be in the water.”
“I think I have seen them, then,” said Agnes; “but I had no idea that they were living creatures.”
“And yet,” returned her mother, “if you were to take one of these jelly-like lumps, not larger than a small pea, and examine it in a powerful microscope, you would find that it possessed six or more arms, which it has the power of stretching out in an extraordinary manner, so as to seize any insect that may come in their way, and which they convey to an opening in the centre of the polypus, which serves as its mouth, and which leads directly to the stomach.”