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Animalcule   Listen
noun
Animalcule  n.  
1.
A small animal, as a fly, spider, etc. (Obs.)
2.
(Zool.) An animal, invisible, or nearly so, to the naked eye. See Infusoria. Note: Many of the so-called animalcules have been shown to be plants, having locomotive powers something like those of animals. Among these are Volvox, the Desmidiacae, and the siliceous Diatomaceae.
Spermatic animalcules. See Spermatozoa.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Animalcule" Quotes from Famous Books



... cryptogamia which I placed beneath my instrument I believed that I discovered wonders of which the world was as yet ignorant. I remember well the thrill of delight and admiration that shot through me the first time that I discovered the common wheel animalcule (Rotifera vulgaris) expanding and contracting its flexible spokes and seemingly rotating through the water. Alas! as I grew older, and obtained some works treating of my favorite study, I found that I was only ...
— The Diamond Lens • Fitz-James O'brien
... in a drop of dew. The microscope cannot find the animalcule which is less perfect for being little. Eyes, ears, taste, smell, motion, resistance, appetite, and organs of reproduction that take hold on eternity,—all find room to consist in the small creature. So do we put our life into every ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... these: but it is curious to observe the community of baseness, and the comparative innocence of awkwardness and inexperience, which at once connote the species and denote the specimens of the later and the earlier animalcule. ...
— The Age of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... individual," you remark, "contributes to form public sentiment, as the labor of the animalcule in the ocean contributes to the coral reefs that rise ...
— Slavery Ordained of God • Rev. Fred. A. Ross, D.D.


Words linked to "Animalcule" :   animalculum, being, organism


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