HALF AN HOUR WITH SEA-WOKMS. 71 



has obtained too firm a hold on the popular mind to 

 be shaken off at a moment. Zoology, however, con- 

 siders no form imperfect. In the grand scheme of 

 adaptation which characterises both the animal and 

 vegetable kingdoms, it fails to see a single object 

 that is not better suited to the habitat it lives in 

 than it could be to any other. Hence if a " worm '' 

 be adapted to the circumstances of its life if the 

 latter have a distinct reference to its organs and 

 structure, it is to all intents and purposes a perfect 

 animal. People are so apt to confound specialisation 

 of function with physiological perfection. Nothing 

 of the kind. Being merely highly organised does 

 not argue that the animal in which these organs exist 

 is more perfect. Pope's remarkable line in this respect 

 is zoologically and physiologically true : 



"As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart." 



A more accurate knowledge of the habits and 

 structure of the very creatures which have furnished 

 the idea of degraded imperfection the common earth- 

 worm shows us that the Creator has as benefi- 

 cently adapted this lowly organised object to the 

 circumstances of its life as He has animals of a higher 

 grade. Its very habit of "eating dust," which 

 superstition has more or less connected with the 

 " primal curse," is done for the purpose of extracting 

 the animal matter richly diffused through the soil 

 thus swallowed. The sea-worms, many of them, 

 follow the same habit, as you may notice for yourself 

 in the castings so abundantly sprinkling the finer 



