Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 1.djvu/275

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CORALS AND CORAL ARCHITECTURE.
275

they are nevertheless connected by intervening tissues which form a thin sheet of animal matter covering the surface of the coral, and through which fluids circulate. This sheet of animal matter unites the polypes, but does not destroy their individuality. The budding process

Fig. 8.

PSM V01 D275 Porites.jpg

Porites from the Feejees; Cells exceedingly small.

takes place in some species by a spontaneous division of the parent polype. So that in the same cell a new polype forms side by side with the old one (Fig. 5, page 260), and begins an individual life, but the results are essentially the same.