56 SCIENTIFIC ILLUSTRATIONS [Com 



Results of Bight Combination. 



The lovely and fragrant rose is composed of no more than a 

 little carbon and water, some ammonia, and perhaps some iron 

 superadded ; and when disintegrated in the chemist's laboratory, 

 can be presented as a few grains and drops of colourless relic. 



TH. 



Commerce the great Uniter. 



Diversity of climate and season of summer and winter 

 over the globe has produced for man's advantage a correspond- 

 ing variety of animal and vegetable life. Man himself has 

 an organic strength which enables him to exist in every clime ; 

 but other animals and all plants have a more limited geographi- 

 cal distribution, and are endowed with constitutions which enable 

 them to thrive in certain regions only. By means of commerce, 

 however, the shortcomings of one climate are happily supple- 

 mented by the riches of another, and all the most useful produc- 

 tions growing upon the earth are thus more widely scattered. 

 The necessary interchange fulfils its purpose of knitting the 

 whole world together in bonds of mutual dependence ; and the 

 man, or set of men, who would restrict commerce between the 

 various countries have obviously failed to understand one, of 

 the greatest and most important of Nature's designs. BE. 



The Advantages of a Commotion. 



A political commotion often does immense service in clearing 

 the moral atmosphere of its corruption. A religious commotion 

 is often of incalculable value in driving away cant, hypocrisy, 

 priestcraft, and fraud. These things may be well illustrated by a 

 storm of wind. It is often observed that storms are followed by 

 a sensible improvement in the air, and by a feeling of increased 

 comfort; hence it may be inferred that they are sent to cure some- 

 thing going wrong in Nature's household. We know that the 

 storm frequently checks the pestilence when human skill fails. 

 On the banks of La Plata in South America, there is a wind 

 which comes charged with the germs of intermittent fever from 

 the marshes lying to the north. The wretched inhabitants droop 



