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H. J. Carter, the celebrated microscopist, that the very lowest embryos, such as the myxomycetes, manifest a will and desires and preferences; and that infusoria, which apparently have no organism whatever, give evidence of a certain cunning.
Thus he establishes a third primary division of the living world, distinct from both animals and plants, under the name of the Protista, to include the Myxomycetes, the Diatomaceae, and the Labyrinthulae, which are commonly regarded as plants, with the Noctilucae, the Flagellata, the Rhizopoda, the Protoplasta, and the Monera, which are most generally included within the animal world.
There is reason to think that certain organisms which pass through a monad stage of existence, such as the Myxomycetes, are, at one time of their lives, dependent upon external sources for their protein matter, or are animals; and, at another period, manufacture it, or are plants.
If they are not, indeed, the Myxomycetes render the drawing of every line of demarcation between Protista and Plants impossible. But if they are, who is to define the Fungi from the Algae? Yet the sea-weeds are surely, in every respect, plants.
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