PENTACRINUS BRIAREUS. 175 



number of pieces will exceed a hundred and fifty 

 thousand. Now, as each joint was furnished with 

 at least two fasciculi of fibres, one for contraction, 

 the other for expansion, we have a hundred and fifty 

 thousand bones and three hundred thousand fasciculi 

 of fibres equivalent to muscles in the body of a single 

 Pentacrinite, an amount of muscular apparatus con- 

 cerned in regulating the movements of the skeleton 

 infinitely exceeding any that has been yet observed 

 throughout the entire animal creation. 



When we consider, continues Dr. Buckland, the 

 profusion of care and exquisite contrivance that per- 

 vades the frame of every individual of this species of 

 Pentacrinite forming but one of many members of 

 the almost extinct family of the Crinoideans, and 

 when we add to this the amount of analogous me- 

 chanisms that characterize the other genera and spe- 

 cies of this curious family, we are almost lost in 

 astonishment at the microscopic attention that has 

 been paid to the welfare of creatures holding so low a 

 place among the inhabitants of the ancient deep, and 

 we feel an irresistible conviction of the universal 

 presence and eternal agency of creative care in the 

 lower regions of organic life. 



As the base or root of the ancient Pentacrinite 

 (Pentacrinus Briareus) was undoubtedly fixed to the 

 bottom of the sea, or to some extraneous floating 

 substance, the flexibility of the jointed column which 

 forms the stem was subservient to the double office, 

 first of varying in every direction the position of the 

 body and arms in search of food, and secondly, of 

 yielding with facility to the course of the current, or 



