28 THE UNIVERSE. 



testines, and their little ones invade the muscles to such 

 an extent, that as many as six or eight have been dis- 

 covered in each segment seen in the field of the micro- 



15. Female Trichina depositing her young, magnified sis hundred diameters. — 

 From Dr. Pennetier. 



scope. A frightful death is the result: we are devoured 

 still living by these imperceptible worms, and no human 

 power can arrest their work. 



Thus the dominion of the Microzoa has no bounds, but 

 immensity itself 



CHAPTER IL 



THE ANTEDILUVIAN INPUSOEIA. 



The prodigious abundance of the Infusoria during cer- 

 tain geological periods is one of the most extraordinary 

 facts that the study of nature offers. Although, accord- 

 ing to the computations of Ehrenberg, there are some- 

 times more than a million of these animals in a cubic 

 inch of chalk, yet they swarmed in such numbers, and 

 were so miraculously prolific, at the era of this formation, 



