420 THE AQUARIAN NATURALIST. 



surmise, that in an object so unobtrusive, they were 

 examining a microcosm that might be regarded lite- 

 rally as a world in miniature, the population of which 

 is hardly to be counted, and possessing a structure, 

 when examined under the microscope, of inexpressibly 

 elaborate character. 



" For curiosity and beauty," says the quaint author 

 of the ' Micrographia/ " I have not, among all the 

 plants and vegetables I have yet observed, seen any 

 one comparable to this sea- weed. It is a plant [so 

 our forefathers pleased to consider it] which grows 

 upon the rocks under the water, and increases and 

 spreads itself into a great tuft, which is not only 

 handsomely branched into several leaves, but the 

 whole surface is covered over with a most curious 

 kind of carved work, which consists of a texture much 

 resembling a honeycomb; for the whole surface on 

 both sides is covered over with a multitude of very 

 small holes, being no larger than so many holes made 

 with a small pin, and ranged in the neatest and most 

 delicate order imaginable, they being placed in the 

 manner of a quincunx, or very much like the rows of 

 the eyes of a fly, the rows or orders being very 

 regular, which way soever they are observed. These 

 little holes, which to the eye looked round, when 

 magnified appear very regularly- shaped holes, repre- 

 senting almost the shape of the sole of a round-toed 

 shoe, the hinder part of each being, as it were, trod 

 on or covered by the toe of that next below it. These 

 holes seemed walled about with a very thin and trans- 

 parent substance, looking of a pale straw colour; 

 from the edge of which, against the middle of each 



