250 THE MICROSCOPE AND ITS LESSONS. 



unusually lively, I said, "J will settle this cheese-for- 

 breakfast business." So, placing a small bit on the 

 microscope, I rang the bell, and said, " I want you, Mary, 

 to look at that, and tell me if you know anything like it." 

 It was night, and the bright light of the lamp illuminated 

 the mass, so that with a moderately deep magnifying 

 glass the mites looked like young sucking-pigs, running 

 about as fast as their eight legs would carry them. You 

 should have heard our Mary's exclamation as she said, 

 " Oh, lor ! what is it ? " And when I assured her it was 

 the bit of cheese which she had left at her early meal, 

 she disappeared, and we never afterwards heard of Mary's 

 desire for cheese for breakfast ! 



One may be reasonably surprised at the vitality which 

 often is so long preserved in the eggs or pupae of an insect, 

 reminding us of the vitality of seeds, though in them, 

 according to Dr. Carpenter, are many plants which spring 

 up when a new cutting of some railway lays bare the 

 virgin soil ; such are not only of prehistoric, but it may 

 be pre-Adamite origin, all light, heat, and moisture, the 

 three ingredients necessary to growth, being excluded. 



I have the best reason for believing the following 

 story. A clerk employed at Guildhall, London, who was 

 an entomologist, sitting one day at his desk, where he had 

 been seated for twenty-two years, noticed what appeared 

 to be a change in the colour of a spot in the mahogany 

 before him; the next day he observed it became a small 

 round hole, and on looking round he saw the pupa of a 

 beetle, and presently out walked the imago the perfect 

 image, that is of the insect. It must have laid there, he 

 concluded, for upwards of a quarter of a century. 



Let me strongly advise you to make any number of 

 experiments with spiders, and especially with their webs : 

 you will be well repaid with the result. You will discover 



