CHAPTER XXXIII 



CUMULATIVE SERVICE 



IN retrospect, to take a bird's-eye view, is seen, 

 at a glance, a service as cumulative as are the 

 wants of life. It covers the whole field. The 

 finer qualities of bread on the table, the choicest 

 flavors of butter and cheese, the appetizing vim 

 of cider and vinegar in their varied uses, are 

 the gift of these beings. To them do we owe the 

 sparkling wine, the foaming beer, the stimulating 

 brandy, whiskey and gin, the thousand and one 

 uses of alcohol throughout the world. 



Back of all this, they serve to enrich the soil, 

 and thus to produce the crops that grow on the 

 face of the whole earth. They do more. They 

 serve to make this bounty perpetual. Owing to 

 their help neither the Air nor the Soil becomes ex- 

 hausted. From day to day, from age to age, the 

 same fertilizing materials are re-born, renewed, 

 and made fresh as ever, to feed again and again the 

 entire vegetable and animal kingdoms forever. In 

 these eternal food cycles microbes form an essen- 

 tial link. 



Our environment in the Visible World consists 

 largely of plants and animals. Were it not for 

 these, we could not live. But this environment is 



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