104 THE UNIVERSE. 



the results are quite extraordinary. This creature, which 

 only weighs about sixty-two grains, can with its two large 

 hands move a weight of about three pounds five ounces, 

 which means that it displays a strength 375 times exceed- 

 ing its own weight ! 



The most superficial observation serves to show the ex- 

 traordinary strength possessed by insects. Sir Walter Scott 

 has related that a garden-snail placed under a candlestick 

 moved it from its place by the efforts it made to regain its 

 liberty ; the same thing, Sir Walter says, as if a prisoner 

 in Newgate were to shake the prison walls by his efforts 

 to escape. 



Notwithstanding their minuteness and the delicacy of 

 their anatomy, some other insects also exhibit a compara- 

 tive strength which astonishes us. Although it is almost 

 puerile to speak of the flea, still we may take it for an in- 

 stance, as it is, unfortunately, known everywhere. M. de 

 Fonvielle, in his interesting work on the " Invisible World," 

 maintains that it can raise itself from the ground to a height 

 equal to 200 times its stature. At this rate, he says, a man 

 would only make a joke of jumping over the towers of 

 Notre-Dame and the heights of Montmartre, and a prison 

 would be an impossibility unless the walls were built more 

 than a quarter of a mile in height. 



If we can scarcely believe in the prodigious movements 

 of the wings of insects and its mosaic of jewelry, their feet, 

 though less agile and less adorned, are yet equally worthy 

 of our attention. Those of the working-bee are perfect 

 masterpieces ; they exhibit at one and the same time a bas- 

 ket, a brush, and a pair of pincers. The brush is an article 



