18 THE ROTIFERA. 



not those huge animals, on earth as well as in sea, who can scarcely drag the 

 weight of their frames— not these alone declare the glory of the Almighty. No ! the 

 smallest also show, just as distinctly, the perfections of their Creator. Yea ! one may 

 say, these even more than those ! A great church clock is certainly a wonderful machine, 

 but a pocket watch — a watch in a ring — is yet more so, and conduces to the greater fame 

 and glory of its maker." 



His description of his chief discovery, that of his Crown Polyp (Stcphanoceros 

 Eiclihornii) is very amusing. " I found," he says, " this extraordinary and marvellously 

 formed animal first in 1761, on July 20, on a water plant, which had been standing some 

 weeks in water. I saw that there was something on the plant which was quite unknown 

 to me. I moved the glass, in order to see if it was something alive, and if it would draw 

 itself together, which happened, to my delight ; therefore I examined it through a lens, 

 but it appeared to me, through this, just like an orange flower which was not yet closed, 

 but which now drew itself together, and now outspread itself. All this stirred up in me 

 a great desire to see this new animal under the glass, but that required skill to get it 

 out, as the glass vessel in which it was, was nearly an ell high, and this animal was right 

 at the bottom. I tried first with the quill of a feather to bring it to the top, but it was 

 continually lost to the eye by shutting itself up. At last I succeeded with a little wire 

 hook in drawing out the plant on which it obviously was, and as soon as I could reach 

 it with the scissors I snipped off a tiny stem, and that brought me out the whole animal 

 unharmed. I placed it at once under the magnifying glass, and saw this matchless 

 creature as it is shown in the engraving." ' What a pleasant picture this is of the 

 grave pastor fishing away with a quill pen to fetch up Stephanoceros from the bottom of 

 a glass beaker a yard and a quarter high ! 



About the same time as Eiclihorn, flourished the great Danish naturalist, 0TH0 

 FREDERIC MULLER. He was an excellent botanist and zoologist, and published 

 works on many subjects. He wrote on the Flora and Fauna of Denmark, on Fungi, on the 

 Hydrachnas, and on Fresh-water and Marine Worms ; but his chief delight was in the 

 Infusoria, and his posthumous work, " Animalcula Infusoria Fluviatilia et Marina, &c." 

 1780, was the first that brought this new kingdom to the knowledge of the naturalist. 



The "Animalcula Infusoria" contains the descriptions and figures of about fifty 

 Rotifera, among which are Lacinularia, Hydatina, Scandium, Triarthra, Brachionus, 

 Anuraa, Pterodina, Euchlanis, Dinocharis, Stephanops, and Mastigocerca. More than 

 half of Muller's species were new when published ; and his figures, taken from life, are 

 beautifully drawn on copper by himself. Of course there is a great lack of detail in the 

 drawings of the internal structure of the animals, but they are an immense advance on 

 those of Eichhorn, the outlines being usually both spirited and faithful. 



Muller's text, too, is as good as his figures. It is the work not only of a naturalist, 

 but of a thoughtful and learned man ; and both the " Animalcula Infusoria " and his pre- 

 vious work, " Vermium Terrestrium et Fluviatilium," abound with admirable and striking 

 passages. In the latter, he thus begins his dissertation on the Infusoria : " The world 

 of the invisible, a world shut to our ancestors, was first entered about a hundred years 

 ago. It breeds monsters of unheard-of form and manner of life, it abounds in miracles 

 as much as do the remote Indies ; but is explored with lesser peril, for it lies everywhere 

 at our very feet, and is not sought out for gold. 



" Each was explored with great slaughter of its inhabitants ; the one often resisted 

 by wasting the lives of its aggressors, the other had no defence but patience. 



" This we owe to the needle, which joined two hemispheres together ; that to the 

 lens, which images alike the solar spots and the infusoria, the widest apart of all things. 



" In this interval what indeed is great, what little ? Man : for he thinks and suffers." 



L. JOBLOT styles himself, " Professeur Royal en Mathematiques, de l'Academie Royale 

 de Peinture et Sculpture, demeurant sur le Quay de l'Horloge du Palais, au gros Raisin." 



1 See PL B, fig. 14. 



