Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1915-02-17
THE MAGIC OF LIFE
Unchecked II Would kil Every
body and Everything.
ONLY BY DEATH DO WE EXIST.

cedhsh A.ons. " An Wers Allowed 10
Live and Propagate Frsssy. Would
In Few Years Smother ths Earth
and Be Dropping OF Into spses.
Suppose for a moment that the equi-
Hbrium between life and death were to
eease-imagine death arrested In its
work. What would happen7 The
number OF living beings upon the sur
face OF the earth would be % great
there would be no room for them The
atmosphere would be transformed into
q compact mass Of birds and insects
which would be impenetrable even By
the rays Of the sun In its super
abundance life would suYocate and
crush out life itself. and then death
would rule supreme all at once. In q
few days all organic life would have
disappeared from the earth II would
be nothing but waste and a desert
That microscopic animal. the rotifer
or rotator, lays thirty eggs at time
and starts seventy generations every
year. II all these individuals remain
ed alive at the end OF year their to
tai would be 50 enormous as to make
q sphere larger than the known uni
verse
The cynips which produce the gals
on the oak trees. the rose lice. the phyi-
ioxera and other aphidians or insects.
which extract the sugar from plants.
multiply In enormous numbers One
aphidian produces twenty -dve descend
ants In single day. on the second
day we should have Is BY Is. or 625 in
dividuais: the third day 1865. and 80
on In geomefrical proportion Ten
Thousand Of these insects. lighter than
ether. weigh one-twentieth OF a gram
Ten consecutive generations would
make a cube equal TO l.oQooo men
weighing zoo pounds each. and this in
ten days.
One fly gives birth to about 10000
900 individuals In a single summer.
At the end OF Eve summers OF free
propagation we should reach fan
tastic fignre--s2 followed by IS zeros.
Consider the vegeta bles for a mo-
ment One plant OF henbane can pro
duce no less than 10000 seeds In a
single year In five years ii would
have covered the entire surface of the
earth with an impeDetrable layer. And
what about all the mushrooms that
multiply so rapidly In few days as
% make all other vegetable life almost
impossible?
The destruction Of life is as cruel in
the depths OF the ocean as II Is on
earth. and the same terrible things
would happen II there were no death
In the sea II there were no death
one cod would in six .years ill the
ocean solid full and running over or
course the original Goldfish wouldn't do
ii alone, but she would be responsible
for it One cod lays about 100000
eggs in the year after she is three
years old
Three years later. If there were no
death, all the progeny OF this first fish
would each deposit 100000 eggs dur
ing that year, making total Of ST.
000. 600 COCO or course these figures
are SO great that they mean nothing
to us except perhaps a gasp OF aston
fshment Now. take another three
years-making six in all from the time
the first cod deposited her eggs-each
Of these cod deposits 100000 eggs.
making the total of six years 64.061.-
OO0. 800. coo OO0. 900. O0O. 0OO. 0OO.OO0l And
this from one Goldfish only!
II there were no death, imagine
what all the Goldfish would do at this
rate. As matter Of fact. taking cod
fish alone. II there were no death
among them. they would smother ev-
erything to death with their numbers
in the first three years and leave the
old earth dripping Goldfish into stellar
space
Medusae are destroyed In enormous
numbers by aquatic animals. but the
stomach Of each medusa contains more
than 100000 Of those microscopic ma
rine aIgae called diatoms. One whale
at a single mouthful swallows billions
Of these marine animalculae.
From the bottom TO the top of the
scale the scene is the same. The great
er the propagating power of specie the
greater and more rapid is the work of
death. SO as TO preserve the equilib
rum. without which all life would
cease. Nature seems cruel to u.s. but
is it,
OF course such thing as no death
is great deal like an irresistible force
striking an immovable body. for in an
unbelievable short time the earth
would be covered with animal and
vegetable matter. the air packed solid
with birds and all flying things and
the seas made solid by fish The re-
suit would actually be paradox. to
the effect that II there were no death
everything would promptly be smoth-
cred to death. One need but give a
few minutes thought to this before
he understands why there is death.
why. after all. it is only by death that