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noun

Animalcule n.

A small animal, as a fly, spider, etc. (Obs.)

(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.

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Etymology of 'Animalcule'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Animalcule" Quotes from Famous Books

... an anachronism to say that ghosts talk: their medium of communication must be pure thought; and one should be able to see their thoughts working, just as one sees the working of the digestive organs in the clear viscera of transparent animalcule. The hard thing of it is that ghosts are chained to the same scenes that chained their bodies, and when they sleep-walk, so to speak, it must be through phases of former existence. What a nightmare for them to go over once again the lived and done, ...

— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King

... joke enough to cause it to be circulated that they were performances of my own in early youth, and they would be looked on and bought up as curiosities. True it is that I took lessons of oil-painting in youth from a little Jew animalcule, a smouch called Burrell, a clever sensible creature though; but I could make no progress either in painting or drawing. Nature denied me correctness of eye and neatness of hand, yet I was very desirous to be a draughtsman at least, and laboured harder to attain that point than at any other ...

— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott

... survival of the fittest does not necessarily include progressive development—it only takes advantage of such variations as arise and are beneficial to each creature under its complex relations of life. And it may be asked what advantage, as far as we can see, would it be to an infusorian animalcule—to an intestinal worm, or even to an earthworm—to be highly organized. If it were no advantage, these forms would be left, by natural selection, unimproved or but little improved, and might remain for indefinite ages in their present lowly ...

— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... shortcomings of the adult the expert machinations of the primary larva, which knows where its victuals are and as its first action introduces itself into the dwelling of the host that is to feed it. How can time and experience be factors of instinct? The newborn animalcule amazes us with its foresight; the adult insect astonishes us ...

— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre

Words linked to "Animalcule" : animalculum, being