It is due you to know this at once, otherwise your thoughtsif your nature be vagrantwould drift towards family skeletons.

It so happens that calcareous skeletons, exactly similar to the Globigerinoe of the chalk, are being formed, at the present moment, by minute living creatures, which flourish in multitudes, literally more numerous than the sands of the sea-shore, over a large extent of that part of the earth's surface which is covered by the ocean.

The specimens were sent for examination to Ehrenberg of Berlin, and to Bailey of West Point, and those able microscopists found that this deep-sea mud was almost entirely composed of the skeletons of living organismsthe greater proportion of these being just like the Globigerinoe already known to occur in the chalk.

of it is of a different nature, and consists of shells and skeletons composed of silex, or pure flint.

The skeletons of the full-grown, deep-sea Globigerinoe are so remarkably solid and heavy in proportion to their surface as to seem little fitted for floating; and, as a matter of fact, they are not to be found along with the Diatoms and Radiolaria in the uppermost stratum of the open ocean.

However, the important points for us are, that the living Globigerinoe are exclusively marine animals, the skeletons of which abound at the bottom of deep seas; and that there is not a shadow of reason for believing that the habits of the Globigerinoe of the chalk differed from those of the existing species.

The great mass of the chalk is composed, as we have seen, of the skeletons of Globigerinoe, and other simple organisms, imbedded in granular matter.

I think you will agree with me, that it must have taken some time for the skeletons of animalcules of a hundredth of an inch in diameter to heap up such a mass as that.

There is more curious evidence, again, that the process of covering up, or, in other words, the deposit of Globigerina skeletons, did not go on very fast.

Dr. Dickie, of Aberdeen, sent these materials to Ehrenberg, who made out that the residuum of the melted ice consisted for the most part of the silicious cases of diatomaceous plants, and of the silicious spicula of sponges; while, mixed with these, were a certain number of the equally silicious skeletons of those low animal organisms, which were termed Polycistineoe by Ehrenberg, but are now known as Radiolaria.

Moreover, in the case of freshwater deposits of this kind it is certain that the action of percolating water may convert the originally soft and friable, fine-grained sandstone into a dense, semi-transparent opaline stone, the silicious organized skeletons being dissolved, and the silex re-deposited in an amorphous state.

Thus, in the whole of the "intermediate zone," the silicious deposit which is being formed there, as elsewhere, by the accumulation of sponge- spicula, Radiolaria, and Diatoms, is obscured and overpowered by the immensely greater amount of calcareous sediment, which arises from the aggregation of the skeletons of dead Foraminifera.

" A few skeletons have been preserved intact, including one said to have been an Austrian bandmaster, a giant eight feet tall.

Of course we use only those sponge-skeletons which are soft; but the cheaper kinds do often contain little flinty needles.

Go there on the next visiting-day, and ask that figure crouched in the corner, huddled up like those Indian mummies and skeletons found buried in the sitting posture, to lift its hand,look upon its heart, and behold, not fire, but ashes.

A number of sketches of women, knights, monks, devils, soldiers, skeletons, etc. Second Album: Les morts pow rire, Bizarreries dédiées à Mademoiselle Julie, par G. A. Becker (sic).

Skeletons playing battledore and shuttlecock with skulls.

Skeletons at a ball.

A circus of skeletons, in two scenes: (1) Leaping through the hoop. (2) One skeleton balancing himself, head downward, on the head of another who is standing.

A duel between skeletons.

A woman recently deceased, surrounded by skeletons offering their compliments.

A spirit has moved in the valley of dry bones, and has clothed with living flesh the gaunt skeletons produced by ignorance, disease, and want.

So many carcases are found in the jungle of animals that have died from disease or old age, or succumbed to hurts and accidents, that the whitened skeletons meet the eye in hundreds.

Great skeletons of trees stood everywhere, stretching out bare and unsightly branches, all bending to the south, shewing the mighty power of the current, when it made its annual progress of devastation over the surrounding country.

A dozen grisly skeletons grinned upon me from pedestals round the room, and in the centre of it, the half dissected body of a man, stretched upon a large lava slab, supported by tressels, was more horrible and odious than all.