The songster heard his short oration,
And, warbling out his approbation,
Released him, as my story tells,
And found a supper somewhere else.

COWPER.

* * * * *




THE INVISIBLE WORLD REVEALED BY THE MICROSCOPE.


A fact not less startling than would be the realisation of the
imaginings of Shakespeare and of Milton, or of the speculations of Locke
and of Bacon, admits of easy demonstration, namely, that the air, the
earth, and the waters teem with numberless myriads of creatures, which
are as unknown and as unapproachable to the great mass of mankind, as
are the inhabitants of another planet. It may, indeed, be questioned,
whether, if the telescope could bring within the reach of our
observation the living things that dwell in the worlds around us, life
would be there displayed in forms more diversified, in organisms more
marvellous, under conditions more unlike those in which animal existence
appears to our unassisted senses, than may be discovered in the leaves
of every forest, in the flowers of every garden, and in the waters of
every rivulet, by that noblest instrument of natural philosophy, the
Microscope.