336 NATURE-STUDY REVIEW ]12:8— Nov., 1916 



our little strip of land was growing, and most wonderful of all 

 life had begun. So now came stories beginning with life's simplest 

 form, protoplasm, and a papier-mache model of the amoeba gave 

 us the "big" idea of it, while a glimpse through the microscope at 

 the living form made us appreciate the wonder of the infinite 

 little. The undecided Eozoon, the Foraminifera, with its cal- 

 carious secretions giving us our first shelled animals, followed. 

 Our next stories traced our slate sponges and coral beads back to 

 their ancestors that followed the Foraminifera and Bryazons, 

 all illustrated with fossil specimens. 



Were the children interested in Paleontology? My friend 

 would have been answered by the absolute quiet of the room, and 

 the eagerness for the next week's story. 



Following the corals and sponges came slides of the grotesque 

 life, of the seas, land and air. These stories were in series and as 

 we passed from age to age the children were quick to see the new 

 forms of life, tracing the evolution of many, and the resemblance 

 of others as the ancestors of many of our living forms. As the 

 hour hand on our geological clock gradually drew nearer, familiar 

 forms appeared. Our ancient cock roach was evolving and we 

 heard our first "fiddler." On down the ages we came and at last 

 got our first glimpse of two of the most beautiful things created, 

 the butterflies and moths with their wings reminding us of "pages 

 from an old illuminated missile" as Wallace so beautifully puts it. 

 The Archaeopteryx was evolving to our lovely birds. The 

 horse, and dog and many of our familiar friends were now perfect 

 pictures. The background so marvellous, so awe-inspiring, so 

 almost overpowering was now partially painted in, and we were 

 ready for our foreground. Now comes the economical value 

 of our birds as well as their asthetic value ; the gathering of cocoons 

 that we may see the butterfly and moth emerge, teaching us 

 lessons we will never forget, but always know with their relation 

 to man. 



This winter we go back again into the dim past. Our world 

 is beautiful in its animal life, but equally beautiful is the plant 

 life, so back to the simplest forms we are going, tracing back 

 the ancestors of our familiar flowers, and will lose ourselves in 

 their wonderful life histories, and through the slides and the 

 microscope again see the wonders of the infinite little and bow our 

 heads to the "Infinite works of Infinite Wisdom." 



