ON DESIGN IN ANIMAL BODIES. 191 



II. 



ON DESIGN AS EXHIBITED IN THE MECHANICAL 

 STRUCTURE OF ANIMAL BODIES. 



In all animal bodies, besides those structures on 

 which their economy and much of their vital func- 

 tions depend, there is a firm texture necessary. 

 Without this, the vegetable w^ould have no charac- 

 teristic form ; and animals would want the protec- 

 tion necessary for their delicate organs, and could 

 not move upon their extremities. We have to show 

 with what admirable contrivance, in the different 

 classes of organized beings, this firm fabric is 

 reared — sometimes to protect the parts, as a 

 shell, and sometimes to give them form and mo- 

 tion, as in the skeleton. 



In vegetables, as in animals, there is a certain 

 firm material necessary to support the parts which 

 are the living active organs of their system, and 

 which are so beautiful and interesting. The lig- 

 neous or woody fibre is a minute, elastic, semi- 

 opaque filament, which, closing in and adhering to 

 other filaments of the same kind, forms the grain 

 or solid part of the wood. The best demonstration 

 of the office of the woody fibre is in the leaf. When 

 the leaf of a plant is prepared by maceration and 



