xxxvin.] CONCLUSION. 



yet each atom under favourable circumstances encloses no 

 less than eight other atoms, each furnished with two 

 vibrating hairs, and endowed with the power of sailing 

 rapidly about in any non-corrosive film of moisture. 



It need hardly be said that various insects and flies, 

 both large and small, commonly eat or imbibe fungus 

 spores. The spores are not only to be seen dusted over 

 the wings or sticking amongst the hairs of the legs, but 

 they are quite as commonly seen inside the insects as 

 out ; this is especially well seen in such small transparent 

 insects as plant-lice or aphides. The spores are carried 

 about with the juices inside the bodies of the insects, and 

 may not only be found in the body, but inside the limbs, 

 and even within the almost invisible antennae or horns. 

 The spores of various fungi not only stick to the bodies 

 of insects, but they germinate upon them and produce 

 mycelium outside, and sometimes, inside their bodies. 

 Mr. G. B. Buckton, F.R.S., in commenting upon our 

 observations on this subject in his Monograph of British 

 Aphides, says the facts need cause no surprise. 



Small as some of these organisms or parts of organisms 

 may be, it must not be assumed that we are acquainted 

 with the smallest objects of nature. On the contrary, 

 every new and true observation about minute things indi- 

 cates that what we already know regarding small things 

 is as nothing when compared with what is not known, 

 and what at present we seem to have but little prospect 

 of knowing. The most perfect and powerful telescopes 

 cannot resolve the more distant nebulae into stars, 

 neither can the most perfect microscopes display to our 

 sight numerous atoms which are believed to exist, but 

 which cannot be seen. Persons possessed of strong 

 vision can often see, both with the telescope and micro- 

 scope, objects that are invisible to persons of ordinary 

 sight It would be very rash, therefore, for any observer 

 to say that certain objects or characters do not exist 

 simply because that observer cannot see them. Neither 



