on their tail, at the approach of a larger animal, erect their head, and inflict the deadly wound in a moment; while some of those who are less so, when closely pursued, or excited by rage or fear, will emit a most horrible foetor, in order, as it were, to force the enemy to retire from the pursuit. The Black Snake of Virginia lays its eggs in dunghills or hotbeds, where, aided by the heat of the sun, they are hatched and brought to maturity. The blind worms betake themselves, at the approach of winter, to those secret recesses, where, in a state of torpidity, they are sometimes found in vast numbers twisted together; and the common earth-worm, when warned of danger from the mole, by the moving of the earth, darts upwards to the surface, and is out of his reach in an instant. Uses of Reptiles.. In a former part we noticed the indispensable necessity of animals of prey, and the bad consequences that must have inevitably ensued had the whole of earth's various tenants been left to die a natural death, and their carcases been left to rot unburied Amongst animals of this description we may undoubtedly reckon the race of Serpents; and whether we consider the fitness of their bodies for entering. the dens, and caves, and holes of the earth, or their voracious appetites for such sort of food in common with reptiles of an inferior order, we must certainly allow that they are wonderfully adapted for the pur K pose. This, then, may be one reason, and a very sufficient one too, for the formation of Serpents, that besides helping to rid the earth of a vast number of the smaller obnoxious vermin, they find their way with the greatest ease into the most secret recesses of putrefaction, and destroy those noisome carcases in a short period, to which the other large animals of similar tastes could not, by the peculiar structure of their bodies, have had access. The use of the Leech is also too well known to need description. CHAP. X. THE OCEAN. "And thou, majestic main! A secret world of wonders in thyself! WHAT a grand and magnificent spectacle does the Ocean present! Whether we view it when wrought up by fearful agitation into all the horrors of the tempest, when the blackness of darkness rides triumphant on the storm, and its foaming billows mix with the clouds, or gaze upon it, with a calm delight, as it gently advances or recedes in soft and hollow murmurs upon the sandy beach, when not a breeze is observed to breathe on its undulating bosom, and every wind is hushed, it is impossible to conceive any thing better calculated to excite in us lofty and sublime conceptions of the Creator. 66 May not the sea," in the words of a modern author, "be styled the temple of contemplation? Viewed in all its stages, it exalts and improves the mind. Its level expanse, when a calm prevails, communicates a similar tranquillity to the reflecting breast; and when its billows lift their devouring heads, they suggest ideas the most sublime, meditations the most solemn. The very nature of the prospect, boundless and unbroken, presents a sensible argument for eternity of duration and infinity of space, more forcible than the subtilest reasoning of metaphysics." The ocean, rolling its surges from clime to clime, is, undoubtedly, the most august object under the whole heavens. A spectacle of magnificence and grandeur which fills the mind, and engrosses the utmost stretch of imagination." What an immense and mighty assemblage of watery particles must be contained in the great deep, and what a prodigious extent of the earth's surface doth it cover! Some natural philosophers, indeed, have carried their ideas on this subject so far as to assert, that if the bed of the sea were empty, all the rivers of the world flowing into it, with a continuance of their present stores, would take at least eight hundred years to fill it again to its present height. If, then, in a single drop of water, as much only as will adhere to the point of a needle, a philosopher has computed no less than thirteen thousand globules> what an inconceivable number must there be in the unfathomable depths, and unmeasurable extent of the ocean! where the eye is lost in wandering over the liquid expanse, and which, if we look upon a map of the world, we shall find to cover a considerably larger portion of the surface of the globe than even the dry land itself. Wonderful as the sea is in itself, and beneficial as it is to the sons of men, all its wonders and all its benefits reflect glory to Him who formed it, and poured it abroad. When we place ourselves upon the shore, and from thence behold that immense body of water, stretching away on all sides, as far as the eye can reach; and when we consider how large a portion of the globe is covered in like manner, what a noble idea are we enabled to form of that Being, who taketh up the sea in his hand, and in whose sight the ocean is no more than a drop; who covered the earth with the deep as with a garment, and assigned it bounds which it cannot pass! And it is truly astonishing by what simple, yet potent means, this great and important end is accomplished; for it is neither by adamantine rocks nor tremendous precipices, nor shelving banks of well cemented sand, that the unruly element is confined within due limits, although these all no doubt lend their aid in repelling the lashings of its surges, and occasional attempts to encroach on the land; but by a barrier, simple, yet more effectual than all these, the word of the great Jehovah's strength, who has impressed upon this element that law of gravitation, by which the waters of the mountains are made to go down into the val BOOK OF NATURE LAID OPEN, .101 lies; and has said to the fluctuating and unstable mass, "Hitherto shalt thou come, and no farther: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed." There are, however, some shores on which the sea has made temporary depredations; where it has overflowed, and after remaining, perhaps, some ages, has again retired of its own accord, or been driven back by the industry of man; but we have an instance of one of a very considerable and lasting nature, which happened in the reign of Henry I. in which the sea overflowed the estates of Earl Godwin, in Kent, and formed that celebrated bank now called the Godwin Sands. In the reign of Augustus, the Isle of Wight also made a part of Britain, so that the English crossed over to it at low water with cartloads of tin; and in the bay of Baiæ, near Naples, there are remains of houses and streets still visible below the present level of the sea. These, however, may have been occasioned by some earthquake, or other internal convulsion of the earth, in which case such tracts would no doubt have sunk, although they had been situated more inland; or if these facts must really be considered as evidences of the encroachment of the sea upon the land, as the advocates for that theory insist, we must bring in the testimony of the Norway fishermen to balance them, who affirm, that the sea upon that coast has become much shallower in many places than it had been; that rocks, formerly covered with water, were now several feet above the surface of the sea, and that loaded vessels used formerly to ride where pin |