CRIXOIDE.E. 



individuals of these kinds are comparatively rarely to be 

 met with : formerly they were among the most nnmerons 

 of the ocean's inhabitants, — so numerous that the remains 

 of their skeletons constitute great tracts of the dry land as 

 it now appears. For miles and miles we may walk over 

 the stony fragments of the Crinoidesc ; fragments which 

 were once built up in animated forms, encased in living 

 flesh, and obeying the will of creatures among the loveliest 

 of the inhabitants of the ocean. Even in their present 

 disjointed and petrified state, they excite the admiration 

 not only of the naturalist but of the common gazer ; and 

 the name of Stone-lily popularly applied to them, indicates 

 a popular appreciation of their beauty. To the philoso- 

 pher they have long been subjects of contemplation as well 

 as of admiration. In him they raise up a vision of an 

 early world, a world the potentates of which were not 

 men but animals — of seas on whose tranquil surfaces 

 myriads of convoluted Nautili sported, and in whose depths 

 millions of Lily-stars waved wilfully on their slender stems. 

 Now the Lily-stars and the Nautili are almost gone ; a few 

 lovely stragglers of those once-abounding tribes remain to 

 evidence the wondrous forms and structures of their com- 

 rades. Other beings, not less wonderful, and scarcely less 

 graceful, have replaced them ; while the seas in which 

 they flourished have become lands, whereon man in his 

 columned cathedrals and mazy palaces emulates the 

 beauty and symmetry of their fluted stems and chambered 

 shells. 



Throughout the animal kingdom we find groups which, 

 when compared with a neighbouring group of equal value, 

 present higher affinities and yet lower analogies. The 

 order before us is a good example, and may serve as an 

 explanation of this rather obscure-sounding doctrine. The 



