MISCROSCOPIC ANIMALCULE. 



97 



jaesent an infinite variety, no less captivating 

 fo the mind than pleasing to the eye. They 

 appear strengthened and distended by the finest 

 bones, and covered with the lightest membranes. 

 Some of them are adorned with neat and beau 

 tiful feathers, and many of them provided with 

 the finest articulations and foldings for the wings, 

 when they are withdrawn and about to be folded 

 up in their cases. The thin membranes of the 

 wings appear beautifully divaricated with thou 

 sands of little points, like silver studs. The 

 wings of some flies a.rejilmy, as the dragon-fly; 

 others have them stuck over with short bristles, 

 as the flesh-fly ; some have rows of feathers 

 along their ridges, and borders round their edge, 

 as in gnats ; some have hairs and others have 

 hooks placed with the greatest regularity and 

 order. In the wings of moths and butterflies 

 there are millions of small feathers of different 

 shapes, diversified with the greatest variety of 

 bright and vivid colours, each of them so small 

 as to be altogether invisible to the naked eye. 



The leaves of all plants and flowers when ex 

 amined by the microscope, are found to be full 

 of innumerable ramifications that convey the 

 perspirable juices tn the pores, and to consist of 

 barenehymous and ligneous fibres, interwoven 

 in a curious and admirable manner. The 

 smallest leaf, even one which is little more than 

 visible to the naked eye, is found to be thus di 

 varicated, and the vai legations are different in 

 the leaves of different vegetables. A transverse 

 section of a plant not more than one-fourth of an 

 inch in diameter, displays such beauties and va 

 rieties, through a powerful microscope, as can 

 not be conceived without ocular inspection. 

 The number of pores, of all sizes, amounting to 

 hundreds of thousands (which appear to be the 

 vessels of the plant cut asunder,) the beautiful 

 curves they assume, and the radial and circular 

 configurations they present, are truly astonish 

 ing ; and every distinct species of plants exhibits 

 a different configuration. I have counted in a 

 small section of a plant, of the size now stated, 

 5000 radial lines, each containing about 250 

 pores, great and small, which amount to one mil- 

 don two hundred and fifty thousand of these va 

 riegated apertures. Even the particles of sand 

 on the sea-shore, and on the banks of rivers, 

 differ in the size, form, and colour of their grains ; 

 some being transparent, others opaque, some 

 having rough and others smooth surfaces ; some 

 are spherical or oval, and some pyramidal, co 

 nical or prismatical. Mr. Hook, happening to 

 view some grains of white sand through his mi 

 croscope, hit upon one of the grains which was 

 exactly shaped and wreathed like a shell, though 

 it was no larger than the point of a pin. &quot; It 

 resembled the shell of a small water-snail, and 

 had twelve wreathings, all growing proportiona- 

 faly one less than the other towards the middle or 

 centre of the shell, where there was a very small 



round white spot.&quot; This gives us an idea of 

 the existence of shell-fish which arc- invisible to 

 the naked eye, and, consequently, smaller than 

 a mite. 



The variety of forms in which animal life 

 appears, in those invisible departments of crea 

 tion which the microscope has enabled us to ex 

 plore, is truly wonderful and astonishing. Micro 

 scopic animals are so different from those of the 

 larger kinds, that scarcely any analogy seems to 

 exist between them; and one would be almost 

 tempted to suppose that they lived in conse 

 quence of laws directly opposite to those which 

 preserve man and the other larger animals in 

 existence. When we endeavour to explore this 

 region of animated nature, we feel as if we were 

 entering on the confines of a new world, and 

 surveying a new race of sentient existence. The 

 number of these creatures exceeds all human 

 calculation. Many hundreds of species, all dif 

 fering in their forms, habits, and motions, have 

 already been detected and described, but we 

 have reason to believe, that by far the greater 

 part is unexplored, and perhaps for ever hid from 

 the view of man. They are of all shapes and 

 forms : some of them appear like minute atoms, 

 some like globes and spheroids, some like hand 

 bells, some like wheels turning on an axis, some 

 like double-headed monsters, some like cylin 

 ders, some have a worm-like appearance, some 

 have horns, some resemble eels, some are like 

 long hairs, 150 times as long as they are broad, 

 some like spires and cupolas, some like fishes, 

 and some like animated vegetables. Some of 

 them are almost visible to the naked eye, and 

 some so small that the breadth of a human hair 

 would cover fifty or a hundred of them, and 

 others so minute, that millions of millions of them 

 might be contained within the compass of a 

 square inch. In every pond and ditch, and 

 almost in every puddle, in the infusions of pepper, 

 straw, grass, oats, hay and other vegetables, in 

 paste and vinegar, and in the water found in 

 oysters, on almost every plant and flower, and in 

 the rivers, seas and oceans, these creatures are 

 found in such numbers and variety as almost 

 exceed our conception or belief. A class of 

 these animals, called Mudusas, has been found 

 so numerous as to discolour the ocean itself. 

 Captain Scoresby found the number in the olive- 

 green sea to bo immense. A cubic inch contains 

 sixty-four, and consequently a cubic mile would 

 contain 23,888,000,000,0(X),000 ; so that, if on&amp;lt;&amp;gt; 

 person should count a million in seven days, ii 

 would have required that 80,000 persons should 

 have started at the creation of the world to have 

 completed the enumeration at the present time. 

 Yet, all the minute animals to which we now 

 allude are furnished with numerous organs of 

 life as well as the larger kind, some of their in 

 ternal movements are distinctly visible, their 

 motions are evidently voluntary, and some of 



