30 THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES 
so rapid, yet so steady and purposelike in their 
succession, that one can only compare them to 
those operated by a skilled modeller upon a forms 
less lump of clay. As with an invisible trowel, 
the mass is divided and subdivided into smaller 
and smaller portions, until it is reduced to ar 
ageregation of granules not too large to build withal 
the finest fabrics of the nascent organism. And 
then, it is asif a delicate finger traced out the ling 
to be occupied by the spinal column, and moulded” 
the contour of the body; pinching up the head 
at one end, the tail at the other, and fashioning 
flank and limb into due salamandrine proportions, 
in so artistic a way, that, after watching the process 
hour by hour, one is almost involuntarily possessed 
by the notion, that some more subtle aid to visior 
than an achromatic, would show the hidden artist, 
with his plan before him, striving with er 
manipulation to perfect his work. 
As life advances, and the young amphibia 
ranges the waters, the terror of his insect con= 
temporaries, not only are the nutritious particles 
supplied by its prey, by the addition of which to” 
its frame, growth takes place, laid down, each in. 
its proper spot, and in such due proportion to the” 
rest, as to reproduce the form, the colour, and the 
size, characteristic of the parental stock ; but even 
the wonderful powers of reproducing Jost parts 
possessed by these animals are controlled by the 
same governing tendency. Cut. off the legs, the 
