periods. On the contrary, the opening scenes | Aristotle, familiar only with the waters of of every chapter in the world's history have been crowded with life, and its last leaves as full and varied as its first. I think the impression that the fauna of the early geological periods were more scanty than those of later times arises partly from the fact that the present creation is made a standard of comparison for all preceding creations. Of course the collections of living types in any museum must be more numerous than those of fossil forms, for the simple reason that almost the whole of the present surface of the earth, with the animals and plants inhabiting it, is known to us, whereas the deposits of the Silurian and Devonian periods are exposed to view only over comparatively limited tracts and in disconnected regions. But let us compare a given extent of Silurian or Devonian seashore with an equal extent of seashore belonging to our own time, and we shall soon be convinced that the one is as populous as the other. On the New England coast there are about one hundred and fifty different kinds of fishes; in the Gulf of Mexico, two hundred and fifty; in the Red Sea, about the same. We may allow in present times an average of two hundred or two hundred and fifty different kinds of fishes to an extent of ocean covering about four hundred miles. Now, I have made a special study of the Devonian rocks of Northern Europe, in the Baltic and along the shore of the German Ocean. I have found in those deposits alone one hundred and ten kinds of fossil fishes. To judge of the total number of species belonging to those early ages by the number known to exist now is about as reasonable as to infer that because Greece, recorded less than three hundred kinds of fishes in his limited fishing-ground, therefore these were all the fishes then living. The fishing-ground of the geologist in the Silurian and Devonian periods is even more circumscribed than his, and belongs, besides, not to a living, but to a dead, world, far more difficult to decipher. But the sciences of geology and palæontology are making such rapid progress, now that they go hand in hand, that our familiarity with past creations is daily increasing. We know already that extinct animals exist all over the world-heaped together under the snows of Siberia, lying thick beneath the Indian soil, found wherever English settlers till the ground or work the mines of Australia, figured in the old encyclopædias of China, where the Chinese philosophers have drawn them with the accuracy of their nation, built into the most beautiful temples of classic lands, for even the stones of the Parthenon are full of the fragments of these old fossils; and if any chance had directed the attention of Aristotle toward them, the science of paleontology would not have waited for its founder till Cuvier was born. In short, in every corner of the earth where the investigations of civilized men have penetrated, from the Arctic to Patagonia and the Cape of Good Hope, these relics tell us of successive populations lying far behind our own and belonging to distinct periods of the world's history. LOUIS AGASSIZ. STRIKE, BUT HEAR.-Eurybiades lifting up his staff as if he was going to strike, Themistocles said, "Strike if you will, but hear." PLUTARCH. THE LEPER. OOM for the leper! Room!" | Whose shadows lay so still Had put their beauty forth beneath the eye Rosy and beautiful, and There was a gracious pride that every eye toil, and up Rose the sharp hammer's clink and the far hum Of moving wheels and multitudes astir, The death-like images of the dark away. Matron and child and pitiless manhood, all 'Twas now the first Of the Judean autumn, and the leaves, stirs The spirit to its bent, might drive away. And very air were steeped in sluggishness. scales Circled with livid purple covered him; scales, Wet not thy burning lip In streams that to a human dwelling glide, Nor rest thee where the covert fountains hide, Nor kneel thee down to dip The water where the pigrim bends to drink, By desert well or river's grassy brink ; "And pass thou not between The weary traveller and the cooling breeze, And lie not down to sleep beneath the trees Where human tracks are seen, Nor milk the goat that browseth on the plain, Nor pluck the standing corn or yellow grain. "And now depart; and when Thy heart is heavy and thine eyes are dim, Lift up thy prayer beseechingly to Him. Who from the tribes of men Selected thee to feel his chastening rod. Depart, O leper! and forget not God." And he went forth-alone, not one of all The many whom he loved, nor she whose name Was woven in the fibres of the heart Breaking within him now, to come and speak Comfort unto him. Yea, he went his way, From all thou lovest, away thy feet must Sick and heartbroken and alone, to die; flee, That from thy plague his people may be free. 'Depart, and come not near The busy mart, the crowded city, more, Nor set thy foot a human threshold o'er; And stay thou not to hear Voices that call thee in the way, and fly From all who in the wilderness pass by. For God had cursed the leper. It was noon, And Helon knelt beside a stagnant pool He drew the covering closer on his lip, He took a little water in his hand Crying, "Unclean! unclean!" and, in the And laid it on his brow and said, "Be folds clean !" blood Of the coarse sackcloth shrouding up his face, And, lo! the scales fell from him, and his He fell upon the earth till they should pass. Nearer the Stranger came, and, bending o'er The leper's prostrate form, pronounced his name: "Helon!" The voice was like the master tone Of a rich instrument, most strangely sweet, Love and awe Mingled in the regard of Helon's eye Coursed with delicious coolness through his veins, And his dry palms grew moist, and on his The dewy softness of an infant's stole. Sweet was the fancy of those antique ages That put a heart in every stirring leaf, Writing deep morals Nature's upon pages, Turning sweet flowers into deathless sages, To calm our joy and sanctify our grief. A kingly condescension graced his lips child; His eye was blue and calm as is the sky As if his heart were moved, and, stooping down, But no! it surely was a pensive girl To whom a flower is precious as a pearl. Fain would I know, and yet I can but guess, How the blue floweret won a name so sweet. Did some fond mother, bending down to And those who reared them must have been bless Her sailing son with last and fond caress, Give the small plant to guard him through the fleet? Did a kind maid that thought her lover all Stout men when they were young; For oft I've heard my grandsire speak How men were growing thin and weak. His heart was twined, I do believe, For memory loved a web to weave That still should breathe and whisper, For many a long, long Sabbath-day. "Think of me"? |