HABITS OF THE EAT, 
457 
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observable when a few drops were moved quickly backwards and forwards in the 
rays of the sun, upon a piece of white porcelain. A moderate magnifier demon- 
strated that these little red points, which with great attention might be seen with 
the naked eye, consisted of Infusory animalculse, which were of a circular form, 
and entirely destitute of external organs of motion. Their very animated 
movements were only upwards and downwards, and constantly in spiral lines. 
The want of a strong microscope prevented more delicate researches, and probably 
all attempts at drying such animals on paper would fail to preserve them, as in 
this instance they appeared to dissolve away into nothing. To nitric acid they 
were remarkaby susceptible; for a single drop mixed in a glass of this living 
water, in almost the same moment terminated the existence of millions. We 
sailed for four hours, at the rate of six miles an hour, through this seven-mile- 
broad stream, before we reached the end, so that its surface was about 168 square 
miles. If we suppose these minute creatures extended only six feet below the 
surface of the water, the enormous number of the whole quite oversteps the 
power of the human mind to grasp. It is hardly probable that these animalculse 
were the occasion of the migration of the Dolphins above mentioned. This 
colouring of the water of the sea has been observed now and then in other 
districts,* but off the coast of Chili it seldom occurs. In the more Northern parts, 
and in the Pacific ocean lying near the Equator, as in the Gulf of Panama, and 
even on the neighbouring coast of California, they are of more frequent occurrence. 
Amongst the great number of sailors who pursue their business on the coast of 
Chili and Peru, and who during two or more years were questioned on this 
phenomenon, only one had ever known it to occur, and that about the same time 
of the year, on the coast of Valdavia. 
HABITS OF THE RAT.f 
By a Student of Nature. 
Zoology is really the most interesting branch of Natural History, though I 
fear a novice taking up one of our present text-books on that subject, would 
*Amongst others Capt. Kotzebue, in his first voyage round the world, saw a remarkable stream 
of coloured water off the coast of Brazils somewhat to the South of Cape Frio. On the surface of 
the sea there appeared a serpentine way of a dark-brown colour, two fathoms broad, and reaching 
as far as the eye could see. The water contained a countless number of microscopic Crustacea , 
and the seeds of a plant which, according to the assertion of the naturalists of the expediton, grew 
only at the bottom of the sea. These last were probably animalculse, related to those above 
described.— Kotzebue’s Entdeckungsreise n. d. Sudsee und der Behrings-strasse. 
t We insert this paper from the Dublin Medical Press with great pleasure, not only on account 
