XII 

 SEQUELS 



TROPICAL midges of sorts live less than a day 

 sequoias have felt their sap quicken at the 

 warmth of fifteen hundred springs. Somewhere 

 between these extremes, we open our eyes, look 

 about us for a time and close them again. Mod- 

 ern political geography and shifts of government 

 give us Methusalistic feelings but a glance at 

 rocks or stars sends us shuddering among the 

 other motes which glisten for a moment in the 

 sunlight and then vanish. 



We who strive for a little insight into evolu- 

 tion and the meaning of things as they are, for- 

 ever long for a glimpse of things as they were. 

 Here at my laboratory I wonder what the land 

 was like before the dense mat of vegetation came 

 to cover every rock and grain of sand, or how 

 the rivers looked when first their waters trickled 

 to the sea. 



All our stories are of the middles of things, 

 without beginning or end; we scientists are 



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