22 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



legions of river and fea-fowls prey upon thefe 

 fiflies : we fhall have good ground for believing, 

 that every fpecies of the vegetable kingdom ferves 

 as a bafis to many fpecies of the animal kingdom, 

 which multiply around it, as the rays of a circle 

 round its centre. 



At the fame time, I have not included in this 

 fuperficial reprefentation, either quadrupeds, with 

 which all the intervals of magnitude are filled, 

 from the moufe, which lives under the grafs, up 

 to the camelopard, who can feed on the foliage of 

 trees, at the height of fifteen feet ; or the amphi- 

 bious tribes ; or the birds of night ; or reptiles ; 

 or polypufes, of which we have a knowledge fo 

 flender; or fea infedts, fome families of which, 

 fuch as the crab-iifh, fhrimp, and the like, would 

 be alone fufficient to fill the greateft cabinets, were 

 you to introduce but a fingle individual of every 

 fpecies. I do not include the madrépore, with 

 which the bottom of the fea is paved between the 

 Tropics, and which prefent fo many different fpe* 

 cies, that I have feen, in the llle of France, two 

 great halls filled with thofe which were produced 

 in the immediate vicinity of that Tile, though there 

 was but a fingle fpecimen of each fort. 



I have made no mention of infeds of many- 

 kinds, as the loufe and the maggot, of which every 



animal 



