l8 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS 



minutes each of these go through the same operation again, and so 

 on for hours. After from three to seven hours of this kind of multi- 

 pHcation the older ones die off, while some of the younger and 

 more vigorous attach themselves to each other in pairs. One 

 entirely absorbs the body of the other into its own and settles down 

 into the quiet, cysted state. Then after a certain time there com- 

 mences to ooze out of this body perfect little clouds ot the minutest 

 spores, until nothing is left of the parent organism but the shrivelled 

 skin. These spores, at first too small to be resolved by the highest 

 powers of the microscope, soon grow to be visible as distinct points, 

 then to push out their httle threads of locomotion, and at length to 

 become full-grown monads, ready to commence the other kind of 

 generation — ^that of self-division. It is estimated by Dr. Dollinge - 

 that fifty millions of these monads could easily disport themselves 

 in a single drop of water. And there is the easy possibility, and 

 even probability, of other realms of living kingdoms still far below 

 the reach of the microscope. 



Turning in the opposite direction, the sharpest eyes can see 

 only about five thousand stars in all the sweep of the heavens. 

 With the highest powers of the telescope it is estimated that twenty 

 millions of stars are visible. Yet all these are only the brightest or 

 the nearest of the suns which compose the great cluster of the 

 Galaxy, or Milky Way, to which system our sun belongs. And this 

 immense aggregation of worlds is only one of thousands of star 

 clusters that are within the range of telescopic observation. Over 

 three thousand star systems, probably in every way similar to the one 

 which hghts our night skies, have already been located in the out- 

 lying regions of space. And what is there beyond ? 



Or suppose you try photography and find yourself rambling, 

 with camera in hand, to paint with pencils of sunbeams, pictures, 

 with an accuracy almost divine. 



Any, or all of these pursuits, tend to make their votaries, obser- 

 vant, thoughtful, to "see sermons in stones, and good in everything." 



Observation, after all, is the great instructor. When a boy, a 

 worthy teacher once said to me. " Be observant. Learn something 

 every day of your life. Do not be like the sailor who has sailed 

 round the world, and when he has returned has no other informa- 

 tion to impart than the prices of tobacco and rum in the various 

 ports at which he has touched." 



