FOSSIL FORAMINATED SHELLS FIIOM BARBADOES. 205 



some straight and yet chambered (Yerneucilina) the 

 variety is immense. They are dredged from the depths of 

 the Mediterranean, the Adriatic, and ^Egean Seas, and on 

 our own coast they are found also plentifully in the white 

 drifted sand, or amongst the corallines in rock-pools. The 

 Cassidulina and Rosalina are the most common in the 

 Channel Islands. The ouze of osyter beds also abound 

 with some species. 



FOSSIL FORAMINATED SHELLS FROM BARBADOES. 



These are of a different kind ; the shells are siliceous ; 

 the variety even on this one slide is probably amazing, and 

 the delicacy of form and workmanship truly worth a long 

 and careful examination. They were first discovered by 

 Professor Ehrenberg at Cuxhaven on the North Sea, after- 

 wards found by him in collections made in the Antarctic 

 Seas. Fancy these fragile and lovely little creatures having 

 been brought up by the sounding lead at the depth of 2000 

 fathoms ! . Such are the beautiful forms which the hand 

 of God has fashioned in His wisdom, where human eye 

 never sees and foot of man never treads, and which, but 

 for our microscope, had remained unknown to us as they 

 have been for the ages past. 



Nothing do we examine thus but it reveals such perfect 

 finish, such loving design of adaptation to the creature's 

 necessities, that we have deeper thoughts than our tongue 

 can utter, and learn lessons that philosophy has never 

 taught. Nothing is done carelessly ; nothing is isolated or 

 loose in the scale of creation ; the plan is seen ever wider, 

 deeper, higher, but complete and in perfect order, whatever 

 part is presented to our finite mind. We see very little, 

 we know very little ; but we gaze on, and our hearts are 

 directed upward even by a slide of microscopic shells sculp- 

 tured with hieroglyphics of the Creator. 



The Barbadoes deposit alone furnishes 282 varieties; and 

 when we consider that in a single ounce of sand 6000 of 

 these shells were picked out, and in another ounce from 

 the shores of the Antilles no less than 3,840,000 were dis- 

 covered ; when we learn that these little shells are increasing 



