There may be a single contractile vacuole, or a plurality; or none, especially in marine and endoparasitic species. The nucleus may remain single or multiply without inducing fission, thus leading to apocytial forms. It often gives off "chromidial" fragments, which may play an important part in reproduction.[67] In _Amoeba binucleata_ there are constantly two nuclei, both of which divide as an antecedent to fission, each giving a separate nucleus to either daughter-cell. _Pelomyxa palustris_, the giant of the group, attaining a diameter of 1''' (2 mm.), has very blunt pseudopodia, an enormous number of nuclei, and no contractile vacuole, though {53}it is a fresh-water dweller, living in the bottom ooze of ponds, etc., richly charged with organic débris. It is remarkable also for containing symbiotic bacteria, and brilliant vesicles with a distinct membranous wall, containing a solution of glycogen.[68] Few, if any, of the Filosa are recorded as plurinuclear. The simplest Lobosa have no investment, nor indeed any distinction of front or back. In some forms of _Amoeba_, however, the hinder part is more adhesive, and may assume the form of a sucker-like disc, or be drawn into a tuft of short filaments or villi, to which particles adhere. Other species of Lobosa and all Filosa have a "test," or "theca," _i.e._ an investment distinct from the outermost layer of the cell-body. The simplest cases are those of _Amphizonella_, _Dinamoeba_, and _Trichosphaerium_, where this is gelatinous, and in the two former allows the passage of food particles through it into the body by mere sinking in, like the protoplasm itself, closing again without a trace of perforation over the rupture. In _Trichosphaerium_ (Fig. 9) the test is perforated by numerous pores of constant position for the passage of the pseudopodia, closing when these are retracted; and in the "A" form of the species (see below) it is studded with radial spicules of magnesium carbonate. Elsewhere the test is more consistent and possesses at least one aperture for the emission of pseudopodia and the reception of food; to avoid confusion we call this opening not the _mouth_ but the "pylome": some Filosa have two symmetrically placed pylomes. When the test is a mere pellicle, it may be recognised by the limitation of the pseudopodia to the one pylomic area. But the shell is often hard. In _Arcella_ (Fig. 10, C), a form common among Bog-mosses and Confervas, it is chitinous and shagreened, circular, with a shelf running in like that of a diving-bell around the pylome: there are two or more contractile vacuoles, and at least two nuclei. Like some other genera, it has the power of secreting carbonic acid gas in the form of minute bubbles in its cytoplasm, so as to enable it to float up to the surface of the water. The chitinous test shows minute hexagonal sculpturing, the expression of vertical partitions reaching from the inner to the outer layer.