ings shows that it would take not many fewer than 

 50,000 to span an inch . . . And yet, compared 

 with the markings of certain other species rela- 

 tively common in Nature, the frustular dot-pattern 

 of this diatom may well be regarded as coarse ! 



Ill 



It would be possible, of course, to pursue for 

 hours my inquiry among the protistan slides alone, 

 without tiring or feeling impelled to seek the at- 

 tractions among the other phyla of my case. But 

 no single sitting could exhaust their wonders. An 

 entire evening or more could easily be taken up 

 with the beauties of even one group, such as the 

 Foraminifera or, say, the Radiolaria: the first- 

 named containing the Globigerinidce, famous for 

 their countless billions of dead skeletons which' 

 compose those great tracts of "Globigerina ooze" 

 covering certain regions of the ocean floor; and the 

 last-named preeminently beautiful among the 

 creatures of the earth, and certainly the very love- 

 liest of all protozoa. 



Notwithstanding their attraction and their in- 

 structive features, the subjects contained in my 

 case are at best but dead and inanimate things; 



[129] 



