The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1875-04-24
Stlisrellaneuus.


In each grain Of sand, there are mar
wells; in every drop Of water, a world. In
that great spectacle called Nature, every
being has its marked place and distinct
role and 10 that grand drama called life,
there presides law as harmonious as that
which rules the movement of the stars
Each hour removes by death myriads Of
existences, and each hour produces legions
Of new lives. The highest as well as the
lowest created organism consumes carbon
and water to support life and its duties,
and it is not uninteresting TO glance at the
food, the habits, and the ways and means,
peculiar to some of the inferior animals.
From their petrifed elections we know
what such fossilized reptiles as the pie
siosaurus, etc. are and may some day be
able to discover the fish aud crustacea
they hunted down. Animals, when not
living by their own respectable efforts, are
either parasites or dependents many
would seem to have positive trades, or are
connected with branches of industry.
There are miners, masons, carpenters, pa
per manufacturers, and weayers, laeemak-
ers even, all working first for themselves,
and next to propagate their kind. The
miners dig into the earth, form natural
arches and supports, remove the useless
soil such as the mole, the chinchilla Of
Peru, the badger, the lion ant, as well as
certain worms and molluscs. The masons
build huts aud places according to all the
rules Of architecture, as the bees and trop-
ical ants: there are fish that construct
boats that the waves never can upset, and
Agassiz has drawn attention TO fish which
builds its nest on the floating sea weed in
the middle of the ocean, and deposits
therein its eggs. The wasps of South
America fabricate sort Of paper or paste
board Spiders are weavers as well as
lacemakers; one species constructs a di-
wing bell, a palace Of lace. When the
astronomer has need Of the most delicate
thread for his telescope, he applies to tiny
spider When the naturalist desires to
test his microscope, he selects certain
shell of sea insect, so small that several
millions Of them in water could not be
visible to the naked eye, and yet no
microscope has yet been made sufficiently
powerful to reveal the beautiful variegated
designs on the atomic shells Aristotle
remarked, and he has since been corrobo-
rated, that variety Of plover enters the
crocodile's mouth, picks the remnants of
food of the animals tongue and from
between its teeth. This living toothpiek
is necessary, as the tongue of the crocodile
is not mobile. The Mexican owl, when
enjoying siesta, puts itself under the
guard of kind Of rat, that gives the alarm
on the approach of danger Parasites are
everywhere, depend on no peculiar condi- :
tion Of the body, and are as abundant in
persons of the most robust as Of the most
debilitated health. They are at home in
the muscles, in the heart, in the yeutricles
of the brain, in the ball of the eye. They
are generally either in the form of leaf
or ribbon, and are not necessarily, as
was once supposed, confined to a special
animal. The parasites of fish have been
detected living in the intestines of birds
and there are some that, for the purpose of
development, must pass into the economy
Of second animal.