love's meinte. 27 



heat and the cold ; which, in structure much resembling 

 the scale-armour assumed by man for very different ob- 

 jects, is, in fact, intermediate, exactly, between the fur of 

 beasts and the scales of fishes ; having the minute division 

 of the one, and the armour-like symmetry and succession 

 of the other. 



29, Not merely symmetry, observe, but extreme flatness. 

 Feathers are smoothed down, as a field of corn l)y wind 

 with rain ; only the swathes laid in beautiful ordei'. They 

 are fur, so structurally placed as to imply, and submit 

 to, the perpetually swift forward motion. In fact, I 

 have no doubt the Darwinian theory on the subject is that 

 the feathers of birds once stuck up all erect, like the 

 bristles of a brush, and have only been blown flat by 

 continual flying. 



Nay, we might even sufficiently represent the general 

 manner of conclusion in the Darwinian system by the 

 statement that if you fasten a hair-brush to a mill-wheel, 

 with the handle forward, so as to develop itself into a 

 neck by moving always in the same direction, and within 

 continual hearing of a steam- whistle, after a certain num- 

 ber of revolutions the hair-brush will fall in love with the 

 whistle ; they will marry, lay an eg^^, and the produce 

 will be a nightingale. 



30. Whether, however, a hog's bristle can turn into a 

 feather or not, it is vital that you should know the present 

 difference between them. 



The scientific people will tell you that a feather is com- 



