SPICULA. 267 



a needle-point separate a bit the size of a rape-seed, 

 and, laying it on a slide of glass, let fall on it a drop 

 of concentrated potass. The fleshy gelatinous invest- 

 ment will thus be dissolved, and the spicula will 

 appear alone, but undisturbed in arrangement. 



What a wilderness of brilliant starry points now 

 meets the eye ! An incalculable multitude of three- 

 rayed stars is seen, as if three needles of glass had 

 been united by their heads, so as to radiate at an 

 angle of 120 degrees. There is no variation in the 

 angle of radiation ; all are exactly alike in this re- 

 spect, though they differ much in the length and 

 stoutness of the rays. They seem as if thousands 

 upon thousands of such stars had been put into a box, 

 and well shaken together, so as to be inextricably 

 interlaced. Some seem, naturally enough, to have 

 been injured by the shaking ; for many a point is 

 broken short off, at varying distance from the diverg- 

 ing centre. Of course, this shaking together is only 

 imaginary; only a homely comparison to help de- 

 scription ; the real explanation of the entanglement 

 doubtless is, that they have been deposited by the 

 living flesh, atom after atom, in succession, and that 

 the points of the newly-formed have shot between 

 and among the interstices of the already existing 

 ones, producing such a tangle that it would probably 

 be impossible, even with pliers ever so fine, to extract 

 one from the mass, without breaking either itself or 

 some of its fellows. 



Of course, I found many more objects of interest 



