ATMOSPHERIC VOYAGERS. 25 a half in dried sand; yet, in two hours after the application of rain-water, the greater part recovered life and motion. Some experimenters have been of opinion that the Rotifera may be really deprived of life, and kept in that state for many weeks, and yet be again restored to animation. Ehrenberg, Humboldt, and all eminent philosophers, however, entirely repudiate this idea; and, quite apart from such testimony, we may be perfectly assured that the mysterious principle of life, no matter how minute the beings in which it has resided, is never once really extinguished without passing irrecoverably beyond all human means of recall, into the care of Him to whom alone belong “the issues from death." Our hasty survey of the microscopic life of the globe would be imperfect without a passing reference to the various minute organisms which are found floating around us, unseen, in the atmosphere. In greater or smaller quantities, the atmosphere always contains these invisible living atoms, their elevation from the earth's surface being sometimes effected by winds, at other times, probably, by ascending vapours. At times vast clouds of these beings are raised into the air, and carried by winds many hundreds of miles from the districts where they originate, rendering the atmosphere thick and heavy, and covering every object on which they fall with what appears to the naked eye a fine impalpable dust. In this manner myriads of forms, both of animal and vegetable life, are dispersed over the earth, and places before sterile and lifeless are converted into abodes of teeming and busy populations. And now let us prevail upon those of our readers to whom the subject of this Chapter may be to any extent new, to reflect a little on what has been brought before them. In spring and summer, for example, when they walk out by the sea-shore, and cast their eyes over the broad expanse of waters, let them remember that those mysterious depths are peopled with myriads of these minute beings, each as perfectly formed, and as beautifully adapted to the part it has to perform in the economy of nature, as the most exalted of organisms. In rambling, too, among green and shady woods, by fragrant hedgerows, or out upon the breezy heaths and open commons, everywhere let them recall the same fact, that, wherever they see, if it be only a few drops of standing water—-in every ditch, and pond, and crystal pool-within and beneath all 26 26 PERFECTION IN MINUTENESS. that meets the eye-there are multitudes of these tiny creatures, living, as it were, in a world of their own, though equally cared for by Him to whom there is neither great nor small. In view of these facts, we may well say with one of the most eminent of living philosophers, "If the astronomer be led from the contemplation of the countless orbs that traverse boundless space, to the adoration of the Creator in His almightiness, so the observation of the perfection of His minutest works, which, though invisible to ordinary ken, unfold new perfections with every increased power of observing them, ought to impress us with a lively sense of that all-caring-for and all-seeing Providence without whom not a sparrow falls to the ground, and by whom every hair of the head is numbered." CHAPTER II. A DISQUISITION ON JELLY-FISH. "Those living Jellies which the flesh inflame, POETS have rarely deigned to sing the praises of the Jelly-fish, which, perhaps, is one reason why there are so few popular errors to correct concerning them. It is somewhat strange, certainly, but the bay-leaves and the professor's gown seldom do well together. The silk is almost sure to suffer. Perhaps it is that that "fine frenzy" in which the poet's eye is wont to roll has something to do with the matter. But, be that as it may, the fact is clear, and we seldom even expect to find correct science "done into " verse. In the passage quoted above, however, the amiable author of "The Borough has given us a noteworthy exception to the rule; and, in the compass of a few brief lines, has finely epitomized the leading points of Jelly-fish economy. Bear with us, good reader, the while we discourse to you for a brief space on these curious samples of ocean confectionery. No one that has paid an occasional visit to the sea-coast can be wholly unacquainted with the Jelly-fish. They are amongst the most familiar objects to be seen in rambling along the shore; and, after violent winds, may often be met with, thrown upon the beach by the fury of the waves. In the calm bright days of summer, numbers of the commoner kinds may be seen gently flapping their way through the still water skirting the shore, their delicate and graceful forms alternately contracting and dilating as they propel themselves along, and sometimes only faintly discernible from the water itself. 28 ABUNDANCE OF JELLY-FISH. It is hardly necessary to say, that the designation "Jelly-fish" is correct only in reference to the apparent nature of their substance, and not at all in respect to any supposed affinity between these animals and true fish. They constitute, in fact, one of the humblest tribes of sentient beings, and appear to come but just within the limits of organic nature. Cast ashore, they exhibit not the slightest sign of life, and often pass amongst fishermen as "sea-blubber." But by far the most general of the popular names under which the Jelly-fish are known, are those which refer to the property which many of them possess, like the nettle, of stinging the hand that touches them. Hence it is that they derive the names of "stingers," "stang-fish," and "sea-nettles," amongst ourselves, and that of "Orties de mer" along the coast of France. It was from this circumstance, also, that Aristotle bestowed upon them the term Acalephæ, the Greek word for nettle, which is still retained as the scientific designation of the entire class. The ocean swarms with these animals, from the equator to the poles; and in the tropic seas the voyager often falls in with vast shoals of them, through which the vessel has to plough its way for many miles. At certain seasons of the year the Jelly-fish visit our coast in countless profusion, resorting principally to the bays and estuaries, whence stragglers are carried by the tides and currents to every part of the shore. In the year 1846, these animals suddenly made their appearance on several parts of our coast, in such extraordinary abundance as to embarrass the fishermen in casting their nets; and, after remaining for a while, they at length disappeared as mysteriously as at first they came. It is only as an occasional haunt, however, that these frail and delicate creatures approach the land; their proper home is the open sea, where, driven by wind and wave, or wandering at their own sweet will, they roam the pathless waste, basking in the sunbeams by day, and at night lighting up the waves with their brilliant phosphorescent fires. One of the most remarkable things in connection with these animals is the extraordinary character of their composition. Nearly all the commoner kinds consist almost wholly of water. The only thing besides water which the most careful examination of their structure reveals, is an exceedingly small quantity of filmy tissue, which, in the living animal, forms an intricate COMPOSITION AND STRUCTURE. 29 network of cells for the retention of the fluid part of its substance. Constituted in this manner, the Jelly-fish are of the most fragile and evanescent character. No sooner are they removed from the water, and no matter how carefully, than their delicate tissues become ruptured, and the contained fluid drains away, so that at the expiration of a few hours, of the whole bulky mass of trembling jelly, nothing remains but a thin pellicle of film, scarcely to be distinguished from an ordinary cobweb. It is a common amusement with boys on some parts of the southern coast, where these creatures are generally known as water-blobs," to catch the smaller varieties, and hold them in the hand, while they thus gradually melt, as it seems, away. Dr. Carpenter states that large specimens, weighing, when first taken from the water, from fifty to sixty pounds, are reduced to a thin coating of filmy web, weighing scarcely as many grains. And what adds to the wonder is, that the fluid which escapes is in no way to be distinguished, even when submitted to chemical analysis, from ordinary sea-water. 66 Mr. Patterson, in his "Introduction to Zoology," relates an amusing case of a farmer, who had been in the habit of employing his men and horses in carting away from the sea-shore large quantities of Jelly-fish for the purpose of manuring his fields, and who, happening one day to hear a lecture in which the structure of these animals was explained, was not a little astonished to find, that in every ton of “sea-blubber,” which he had been taking so much trouble to obtain, the entire amount of solid matter was scarcely more than he could carry home in one of his coat-pockets. In none of these animals, so far as is yet known, is there anything like a distinct nervous system. Some few investigators have imagined that they could detect the presence of nervous threads or filaments, but the suspicion has never been verified, and the physiologist still ranks the Jelly-fish with the animals whose nervous matter, if they have any, is indistinct and beyond our powers of discovery. Respiration, too, is carried on by means equally obscure; the probability being, that all the air required for the purpose is separated from the sea-water as it freely passes through the channels of the body. In some species there are some small red spots around the margin of the body, which are regarded as rudimentary eyes, although it is by no means certain that they are endowed with the power of vision. It is |