122 SCIENTIFIC ILLUSTRATIONS [Fit 



The Finical Disposition. 



Humboldt states that the Capuchin Saki (a monkey inhabit- 

 ing Brazil, Guiana, and Columbia) takes the most minute 

 precautions not to wet its beard. When it is thirsty, it seats 

 itself by the side of a stream, and scooping up the water in the 

 hollow of its hand, carries it to its mouth, repeating these 

 movements as often as may be necessary to quench thirst, but 

 without ever wetting or rumpling its valued chin appendage. 

 It is not, however, with all this affectation of nicety, superior 

 to other monkeys in other particulars. It is a good representa- 

 tive of the finical character amongst men of that individual 

 who is punctiliously careful not to crease a glove, ruffle a hat, 

 or soil a boot, yet in all essential particulars and habits is not 

 one whit better than his fellow-men. M. 



Fits and Starts. 



It is sometimes complained of a great genius that he works 

 by "fits and starts." The fact, however, is that this is in 

 some cases the natural way of making up the required work. 

 Let us refer to the phenomena of the sea. Instances of com- 

 motion in the sea at uncertain intervals the making, as it 

 were, of efforts by fits and starts to keep up to time in the 

 performance of its manifold offices are not unfrequent, nor 

 are they inaptly likened to spasms. The sudden disruption of 

 the ice which Arctic voyagers tell of, the immense bergs which 

 occasionally appear in groups near certain latitudes, the vari- 

 able character of all the currents of the sea now fast, now 

 slow, now running this way, then that may be taken as so 

 many signs of the tremendous throes which occur in the bosom 

 of the ocean. Sometimes the sea recedes from the shore, as if 

 to gather strength for a great rush against its barriers, as it did 

 when it fled back to join with the earthquake and over- 

 whelm Callao in 1746, and again Lisbon nine years afterwards. 

 Colossal power cannot be expected always to work with the 

 mechanical precision of a watch, and perform a uniform number 

 of movements each minute. T. 



