THE BUNDLE OF STICKS.

A HUSBANDMAN who had a quarrelsome family, after having tried in vain to reconcile them by words, thought he might more readily prevail by an example. So he called his sons and bade them lay a bundle of sticks before him. Then having tied them up into a fagot, he told the lads, one after another, to take it up and break it. They all tried, but tried in vain. Then, untying the fagot, he gave them the sticks to break one by one. This they did with the greatest ease. Then said the father: "Thus, my sons, as long as you remain united, you are a match for all your enemies; but differ and separate, and you are undone."

THE FOX AND THE HEDGEHOG.

A Fox, swimming across a very rapid river, was carried by the force of the current into a deep ravine, where he lay for a long time very much bruised and sick, and unable to move. A swarm of hungry, blood-sucking Flies settled upon him. A Hedgehog, passing by, compassionated his sufferings, and inquired if he should drive away the Flies that were tormenting him. "By no means," replied the Fox; "pray do not molest them."-"How is that?" said the Hedgehog; "do you not want to be rid of them?". "No," returned the Fox; "for these Flies which you see are full of blood, and sting me but little; and if you rid me of these which are already satiated, others more hungry will come in their place, and will drink up all the blood I have left."

JEAN LOUIS RODOLPHE AGASSIZ.

AGASSIZ, JEAN LOUIS RODOLPHE, a celebrated Swiss-American naturalist and author, born at Motier, Switzerland, May 28, 1807; died at Cambridge, Mass., December 14, 1873. Before coming to America, in 1846, he had distinguished himself by his researches in various departments of natural history and science, notably by his great works written in French, upon Fossil Fishes and upon the Glaciers of the Alps. Toward the close of 1847 the Scientific School at Cambridge, Mass., was founded by Mr. Abbott Lawrence, and Agassiz accepted the position of Professor of Zoology and Geology in the new institution. He subsequently, for a short time, held the chair of Comparative Anatomy in the Medical College at Charleston, S. C., and in 1868 was appointed a non-resident professor in Cornell University, at Ithaca, N. Y. In 1865 he took charge of a scientific expedition, most liberally provided for by a merchant of Boston, to explore the waters of Brazil. A narrative of this expedition was published, written mainly by Mrs. Agassiz. He subsequently made a scientific excursion to the Rocky Mountains; and in December, 1871, accompanied by several other men of science, he set out on a voyage around Cape Horn, in the United States Coast Survey steamer "Hassler." The results of this voyage, undertaken for deep-sea dredging, were of great importance in the study of oceanic fauna. The influence of Agassiz upon the scientific development of the United States was profound and farreaching. Joined with his great scientific ability, he had the faculty of communicating the results of his investigations, and propounding his theories, in an attractive form. He therefore deservedly holds a high place not only in science, but also in literature.

FORMATION OF CORAL REEFS.1

(From "Methods of Study in Natural History.")

FOR a long time it was supposed that the reef-builders inhabited very deep waters; for they were sometimes brought up upon sounding-lines from a depth of many hundreds or even thousands of feet, and it was taken for granted that they must 1 By permission of Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

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have had their home where they were found: but the facts recently ascertained respecting the subsidence of ocean-bottoms have shown that the foundation of a coral-wall may have sunk far below the place where it was laid. And it is now proved, beyond a doubt, that no reef-building coral can thrive at a depth of more than fifteen fathoms, though corals of other kinds occur far lower, and that the dead reef-corals, sometimes brought to the surface from much greater depths, are only broken fragments of some reef that has subsided with the bottom on which it was growing. But though fifteen fathoms is the maximum depth at which any reef-builder can prosper, there are many which will not sustain even that degree of pressure; and this fact has, as we shall see, an important influence on the structure of the reef.

Imagine now a sloping shore on some tropical coast descending gradually below the surface of the sea. Upon that slope, at a depth of from ten to twelve or fifteen fathoms, and two or three or more miles from the mainland, according to the shelving of the shore, we will suppose that one of those little coral animals, to whom a home in such deep waters is congenial, has established itself. How it happens that such a being, which we know is immovably attached to the ground, and forms the foundation of a solid wall, was ever able to swim freely about in the water till it found a suitable resting-place, I shall explain hereafter, when I say something of the mode of reproduction of these animals. Accept, for the moment, my unsustained assertion, and plant our little coral on this sloping shore, some twelve or fifteen fathoms below the surface of the sea.

The internal structure of such a coral corresponds to that of the sea-anemone. The body is divided by vertical partitions from top to bottom, leaving open chambers between; while in the centre hangs the digestive cavity, connected by an opening in the bottom with all these chambers. At the top is an aperture serving as a mouth, surrounded by a wreath of hollow tentacles, each one of which connects at its base with one of the chambers, so that all parts of the animal communicate freely with each other. But though the structure of the coral is identical in all its parts with the sea-anemone, it nevertheless presents one important difference. The body of the sea-anemone is soft, while that of the coral is hard.

It is well known that all animals and plants have the power of appropriating to themselves and assimilating the materials they need, each selecting from the surrounding elements whatever

contributes to its well-being. Now, corals possess in an extraordinary degree the power of assimilating to themselves the lime. contained in the salt water around them; and as soon as our little coral is established on a firm foundation, a lime deposit begins to form in all the walls of its body, so that its base, its partitions, and its outer wall, which in the sea-anemone remain always soft, become perfectly solid in the polyp coral, and form a frame as hard as bone.

It may naturally be asked where the lime comes from in the sea which the corals absorb in such quantities. As far as the living corals are concerned the answer is easy, for an immense deal of lime is brought down to the ocean by rivers that wear away the lime deposits through which they pass. The Mississippi, whose course lies through extensive lime regions, brings down yearly lime enough to supply all the animals living in the Gulf of Mexico. But behind this lies a question, not so easily settled, as to the origin of the extensive deposits of limestone found at the very beginning of life upon earth. This problem brings us to the threshold of astronomy; for the base of limestone is metallic in character, susceptible therefore of fusion, and may have formed a part of the materials of our earth, even in an incandescent state, when the worlds were forming. But though this investigation as to the origin of lime does not belong either to the naturalist or the geologist, its suggestion reminds us that the time has come when all the sciences and their results are so intimately connected that no one can be carried on independently of the others. Since the study of the rocks has revealed a crowded life whose records are hoarded within them, the work of the geologist and the naturalist has become one and the same; and at that border-land where the first crust of the earth was condensed out of the igneous mass of materials which formed its earliest condition, their investigation mingles with that of the astronomer, and we cannot trace the limestone in a little coral without going back to the creation of our solar system, when the worlds that compose it were thrown off from a central mass in a gaseous condition.

When the coral has become in this way permeated with lime, all parts of the body are rigid, with the exception of the upper margin, the stomach, and the tentacles. The tentacles are soft and waving, projected or drawn in at will; they retain their flexible character through life, and decompose when the animal dies. For this reason the dried specimens of corals preserved in museums do not give us the least idea of the living corals, in

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which every one of the millions of beings composing such a community is crowned by a waving wreath of white or green or rose-colored tentacles.

As soon as the little coral is fairly established and solidly attached to the ground, it begins to bud. This may take place in a variety of ways, dividing at the top or budding from the base or from the sides, till the primitive animal is surrounded by a number of individuals like itself, of which it forms the nucleus, and which now begin to bud in their turn, each one surrounding itself with a numerous progeny, all remaining, however, attached to the parent. Such a community increases till its individuals are numbered by millions, and I have myself counted no less than fourteen millions of individuals in a coral mass of Porites measuring not more than twelve feet in diameter. The so-called coral heads, which make the foundation of a coral wall, and seem by their massive character and regular form especially adapted to give a strong, solid base to the whole structure, are known in our classification as the Astræans, so named on account of the little [star-shaped] pits crowded upon their surface, each one of which marks the place of a single more or less isolated individual in such a community.

METAMORPHOSES OF ANIMALS.

(From "Outlines of Comparative Physiology.")

UNDER the name of "metamorphoses" are included those changes which the body of an animal undergoes after birth, and which are modifications in various degrees of its organization, form, and mode of life. Such changes are not peculiar to certain classes, as has been so long supposed, but are common to all animals without exception. Vegetables also undergo metamorphoses, but with this essential difference, that in vegetables the process consists in an addition of new parts to the old ones. A succession of leaves differing from those which preceded them comes in each season; new branches and roots are added to the old stem, and woody layers to the trunk.

In animals the whole body is transformed, in such a manner that all the existing parts contribute to the formation of the modified body. The chrysalis becomes a butterfly; the frog, after having been herbivorous during its tadpole state, becomes carnivorous, and its stomach is adapted to this new mode of life; at the same time instead of breathing by gills, it becomes an