THE ANIMAL KINGDOM. 



83 



of the electric battery, it tore up, almost without any noise, 

 the sides of an imposing mass of chalk, the debris of which, 

 computed at about 1,000,000 tons, was precipitated into the 

 sea, spreading itself in a layer twenty feet thick over an 

 extent of fifteen acres. 



Against what were these formidable engines of war em- 

 ployed ? Against what was this gigantic effort of the hu- 

 man mind projected ? Simply the piled-up skeletons of lit- 

 tle animalcules which the finger would crush by thousands ! 



32. Chalk of Meudon, seen with the microscope. 



The shells of the microscopic molluscs which compose 

 mountains are only formed of carbonate of lime, and are 

 so extremely small that it has been calculated it would re- 

 quire about 10,000,000 to make a pound of chalk, and that 

 there are more than 150,000,000 in a cubic yard. Favored 

 by their inconceivable fecundity, these animalcules filled 



