SCIENCE FOR LANDSHARKS.

Patea Mail, 11 December 1880, Page 2

SCIENCE FOR LANDSHARKS.

Amateur Science is going ahead. Some shells have been discovered in sinking a deep well at Marton, and these arc supposed to be marine shells; and we are seriously informed that those “ enclosed moll ticks sported upon the sands of antodeluvian oceans perhaps long ere even Adam and Eve bethought them of fig leaves, and when this small island formed part of the surmised antarctic continent now submerged as a lesson to land sharks.” Now this is a puzzling jumble of theory and fact and bad spelling. “ Mollucks” must be a new species of antodeluvian monster peculiar to the Marton-cnm-Wanganui stratifications. This is the first discovery of the kind, so far as we know. These “ mollucks ” may be molluscs ; but this is only a timid guess of ours. The discovery of so-called mollucks at Marton is traced somehow to a time anterior to Adam and Eve and the fig-leaf aprons. Our knowledge on this subject is only second-hand. We were not there, and cannot know except on the assurance of very old people at Marton that they remember a time when ‘•'mollucks sported upon the sands” at Marton, and that the lig-lcaf costume had not then come into use.

But that other scientific revelation captivates our fancy even more—“ the antarctic continent submerged as a lesson to landsharks,” It is written that the wicked Cities of the Plain were destroyed with lire because seven holy men could not be found in them—nor, as an ultimatum, could even one good man be found. How must it have been with this antarctic continent which was so wicked that it is “ now submerged as a lesson to landsharks.” AVhat fearful sharkers those antodeluvian fellows must have been, when a whole continent had to be sunk “as a lesson!” It is not clear whether the lesson was for them or for these latter-day sharks. Deponent only sayeth it was a “ lesson to landsharks.” These bo words of fearful import, for as lessons arc not usually given to dead sharks, they must be for the living ; and if this Marton lesson is for living sharks, it portends that unless these wicked landsharks take heed, the land which they arc trying to seize with ravenous claw will be “ submerged as a lesson to landsharks.” It is to be feared that, unless the great sharking landrings arc “ up a tree,” they will soou be “ submerged,” and all their jews-harp purchases and leases will be undone.