120 HIDDEN BEAUTIES OF NATURE 



in shilling or sixpenny packages, the soil of the pear- 

 shaped continent. Ostensibly we use it above board 

 (i.e. the knife-board) as knife polish ; but we are 

 keeping it to augment our soil, and it is only a 

 question of time to see it all conveyed to our shores. 



The men who make the microscopic study of 

 diatoms their hobby are rudely termed 'diatomaniacs.' 

 Yet there are few studies more fascinating, or that so 

 well repay for any trouble expended upon their 

 individual examination. Some of the greatest men 

 in England, America, France, and Germany are skilled 

 diatomists. Although these tiny plants are so insig- 

 nificant apparently, yet large volumes have been 

 written about them, and the highest art has been 

 brought to bear upon the illustrations which are used 

 to make their study easy and attractive. But no 

 illustration and no word-painting can at all compare 

 with a five minutes' peep through a powerful micro- 

 scope, when a group of diatoms is in view. 



The astronomer tell us that, so far as is known, the 

 outermost planet of this system is Neptune ; that it 

 travels more than three miles every second ; that it 

 takes, even at this rate, 165 years to complete one 

 revolution around the sun ; that, in fact, it is now 

 (1895) only arriving at that point in its orbit where it 

 last was in the third year of George the Second (1730). 

 The effort of thinking power required to lay hold on 

 such a statement is unattainable by most people, if at 

 all by any one. But the distance of this planet is a 

 mere trifle to those which the astronomer deals with 



