THE ANIMAL CREATION ; 



A POPULAK INTEODUCTION TO ZOOLOGY. 



CHAPTER I. 



The science of Zoology teaches us the forms and 

 habits of the countless animals with wliich we are 

 everywhere surrounded, their mutual dependencies 

 upon each other, and their relative importance in the 

 economy of Nature. Among the innumerable beings 

 which crowd this world not one is idle ; all are actively 

 employed each in its sejiarate sphere of usefulness, 

 and though they blindly do the work imposed upon 

 them by their Glreat Creator, ignorant of other's ways, 

 the grand result is perfect harmony. 



When we consider how innumerable are the species 

 of animals distributed over the whole surface of the 

 earth, and throughout the immeasurable realms of 

 water, and are called upon to recognise them indi- 

 vidually, and to identify all the members of such a 

 multifarious host, the task might well be considered 

 as hopeless as that of the unlettered savage who, 

 unable to count beyond twenty, sets about the enu- 

 meration of the stars, and tries to fix their places and 

 assign their names. Yet even those stars have been 

 reduced to order, the very skies have been mapped 

 out, and the astronomer points with as much satis- 

 faction to the buckle of Orion's belt or the tip of the 

 nose of Bootes, as if these respectable gentlemen 

 were up on high sitting for their portraits. 



B 



