CLASSIFICATION AND CREATION. 65 
the number contained on such a surface, I found 
that there were not less than eight millions of 
eggs in the whole string. The fertility of these 
lower animals is truly amazing, and is no doubt 
a provision of Nature against the many chances 
of destruction to which these germs, so delicate 
and often microscopically small, must be exposed. 
The higher we rise in the Animal Kingdom, the 
more limited do we find the number of progeny, 
and the care bestowed upon them by the parents 
is in proportion to this diminution. 
The subsequent adventures of these germs 
form so odd a sequel to their early history, that 
I will add it here. The eggs are hatched in the 
water, the embryos first making their appearance 
as little transparent bodies, moving about by 
means of verbratile cilia. Their only appen- 
dages are minute horns attached to one end of 
the body. Strange to say, their next step in life 
is to creep into the legs of grasshoppers and bur- 
row their way into the abdominal cavity of these 
animals, where they undergo their further develop- 
ment as Worms, sometimes growing to be two or 
three inches in length before they are freed. 
When they have grown so large that the grass- 
hopper becomes distended by the size of its 
strange inhabitant, it bursts, the Worm is re- 
leased, and returns to its aquatic life. When 
familiar with the vicissitudes in the life of these 
B 
