SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



Life 



trees the trunks, which have in great meas- 

 ure ceased to produce buds, recommence 

 producing them if the branches are cut off; 

 sometimes aerial branches send down roots 

 to the earth, and under some circumstances 

 the roots, tho not in the habit of developing 

 leaf-bearing organs, send up numerous 

 suckers. When the excretion of bile is ar- 

 rested, part goes to the skin and some to the 

 kidneys, which presently suffer under their 

 new task. . . . The excretion of car- 

 bonic acid and absorption of oxygen are 

 mainly performed by the lungs, in creatures 

 which have lungs; but in such creatures 

 there continues a certain amount of cutane- 

 ous respiration, and in soft-skinned batra- 

 chians like the frog this cutaneous respira- 

 tion is important. SPENCER Biology, pt. ii, 

 ch. 3, p. 208. (A., 1900.) 



1898. LIFE, MICROSCOPIC, IN THE 

 ALPINE LAKES Organisms Invisible by 

 Transparency. Perhaps few of the many 

 thousands of people who annually rock upon 

 the blue lakes among the Alps, feeling per- 

 fectly at home, ever dream that in this crys- 

 tal flood there also float myriads of active 

 animals. But the very monotony of the con- 

 ditions of life there corresponds to the 

 composition of the pelagic fauna. Besides 

 wheel-animalculse, representatives of the 

 smallest life (Infusoria flagellata) are 

 frolicking among the countless numbers of 

 microscopic algae; and a few varieties of 

 tiny crabs from a few millimeters to two 

 centinjeters in length also inhabit these high 

 lakes in tremendous numbers. They are 

 queer fellows with immense paddle arms and 

 long projections of the body that serve as 

 balancing poles, for they are condemned for 

 life to swim without ever resting in their 

 fluid element, whose specific gravity is of 

 course only a little greater than that of 

 their bodies. ' Any one confronted for the 

 first time with these animalcule in a glass 

 of water would seek in vain for them, even 

 if there were hundreds, as it is only after 

 the most minute observation that the dark 

 pigment of the eyes or the faintest coloring 

 of the contents of the intestines will betray 

 their presence. The transparency of the 

 bodily substance of the pelagic sea animals 

 has long been known. Here, as there, this 

 adaptation to the constitution of the water 

 is a means of protecting the delicate crea- 

 tures from extermination, because it with- 

 draws them from the view of their pursuer. 

 Since, from the tenderness of their bodies, 

 they would not be able to endure the beating 

 of the waves, the minutest crinkling of the 

 water's surface, the gentlest breath of wind, 

 will drive them into depths where the move- 

 ments on the surface of the water are no 

 longer experienced. GRAFF Die Fauna der 

 Alpenseen, p. 12. (Translated for Scientific 

 Side-Lights.) 



1 899. LIFE MOLDS ENVIRONMENT 



Beavers Changing Surface of Continent. 

 Beaver-dams afford still another illustration 



of the manner in which drainage is ob- 

 structed and lakes formed by organic 

 agencies. Beavers formerly lived over near- 

 ly the whole of North America, and are still 

 found in limited numbers in the Northern 

 States and Canada, and extending south- 

 ward along the Cordilleras at least as far 

 as New Mexico. The dams they constructed 

 with great intelligence and skill, across 

 small streams, retained drift logs and 

 floating leaves, thus leading to the accumu- 

 lation of deposits which obstructed the 

 drainage for a long time after they had been 

 abandoned by the animals that built them. 

 The ponds and swamps due to the work of 

 beavers number tens of thousands, and have 

 produced important changes in the minor 

 features of the surface of the continent. 

 Many of these ponds, after becoming choked 

 with vegetation and converted into peat 

 swamps, have been drained and furnish rich 

 garden-lands. RUSSELL Lakes of North 

 America, ch. 1, p. 27. (G. & Co., 1895.) 



1 9OO. LIFE, NATURAL, DEFINED 



The Sum Total of the Functions that Resist 

 Death Life, Spiritual, the Sum Total of the 

 Functions that Resist Sin. This law, which 

 is true for the whole plant-world, is also 

 valid for the animal and for man. Air is 

 not life, but corruption so literally corrup- 

 tion that the only way to keep out corrup- 

 tion, when life has ebbed, is to keep out air. 

 Life is merely a temporary suspension of 

 these destructive powers; and this is truly 

 one of the most accurate definitions of life 

 we have yet received " the sum total of the 

 functions which resist death." 



Spiritual life, in like manner, is the sum 

 total of the functions which resist sin. The 

 soul's atmosphere is the daily trial, circum- 

 stance, and temptation of the world. And 

 as it is life alone which gives the plant 

 power to utilize the elements, and as, with- 

 out it, they utilize it, so it is the spiritual 

 life alone which gives the soul power to 

 utilize temptation and trial; and without 

 it they destroy the soul. DRTJMMOND Nat- 

 ural Law in the Spiritual World, essay 2, p. 

 93. (H. Al.) 



1901. LIFE, NATURE OF, UN- 

 KNOWN TO SCIENCE Science has cast no 

 light on the ultimate nature of life. But 

 whatever it be, it has evidently funda- 

 mental elements which are the same 

 throughout the whole circle of the organic 

 world. ARGYLL Unity of Nature, ch. 2, p. 

 29. (Burt.) 



1902. LIFE, NONE, WITHOUT AN- 

 TECEDENT LIFE Refutation of the Theory 

 of Spontaneous Generation. Standing on 

 the Mer de Glace, near the Montanvert, he 

 [Pasteur] snipped off the ends of a number 

 of hermetically sealed flasks containing or- 

 ganic infusions. One out of twenty of- the 

 flasks thus supplied with glacier air showed 

 signs of life afterwards, while eight out of 

 twenty of the same infusions, supplied with 

 the air of the plains, became crowded with 



