Nature's Masterpiece.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 8060, 6 March 1906, Page 4

Nature's Masterpiece.

i. On a fine day during the Cambrian Era bright sunshine flooded the beat that our old Earth could do in the way of seenerj at that remote period. Huge mud-flats extended for thousands of miles on every band, and between them stretched shallow oceans. Humble forms of vegetation flourished in the mud rind a heavy atmosphere, dense as 6team, covered all. The air was full of noble rainbows—probably the most beautiful phenomena known to Cambrian times. Absolute silence marked the scene. No feather made music in the air; no fin tippled the water; no beast or herd of beasts moved apon the face of the earth to break the terrific monotony of that prehistoric picture. Suddenly upon a steaming mud-Hat there appeared a liitle lobster-like creature of • many joints, large eyes, and various feelers arranged like whiskers around his jaws. JIo was twenty inches in length and carried himBelf withconsciousdignity, albeitmud knocks dignity out of almost anything butu trilohite. But this triiobite, for such ho was, surveyed that Cambrian noon pensively, cnrled his whiskers with thought and wriggled his ahin- : ing joiuts in the sun. Presently a hen trilobite appeared and squatted beside him placidly. *' When I survey this Bpeolacle," said the triiobite, "when I reflect that tho world is empty bat for us, I am often tempted to wonder." He rolled big goggle eyes towards the lenith. "Wonder? Whatat?" asked his lafiy. Barely as tho lord of creation, you have a right to everything here ? You're the mwfc wonderful thing in the mud, after all: ean walk about and tatk—in fact, you' v alive—a live creature Nature's mast f piece. l ' 41 It would be easy and pleasant to thiak so," mused the triiobite, " but sometimes in raro fits of modesty, I almost fancy that I am not the best that Nature can do. I even picture something bigger, better, more beautiful than a triiobite. It may be morbid, but I do." " This is nonsense and stuff, my dear. You're fishing for compliments. Bigger ? Good heavens, you're twenty inches long—isn't that big enough for anybody ? Better? Well, your a good husband and a father—what better could any triiobite be ? And as to beauty—l shonldn't have married you if you had not been about the' handsomest gentleman triiobite that ever sat and curled his whiskers in the sun. Nature never made anything better than a triiobite. Why? Because she can't. Can you picture anything different—can you imagine any creature with more convenient limbs, more exquisite joints, more perfect claw.?, belter eyesight, better senses, better manners, or mare Wlf-respecting ? You know you can't." 14 1 actually cannot picture the creature, but I can picture the possibility of such a creature. " Twaddle," said Mrs. Triiobite, " we're cbe best and last, so there's an end of it. The world was made for us." She had the final word, very properly, and the triiobite shrugged his shoulders and waddled off to his family. Still he doobted. 11. Some millions of millions of years having passed by, we find ourselves, upon a bright afternoon of Mesozoic times, in the company of that genial and gigantic Deinosaur, Brontosaurus Excelsus. The monster despite pleasant climatic conditiins, was ill at ease. He sat upon his haunches, swayed his

enormous neck to the right and left, and listlessly chewed of! the heads of six lofty palm trees. There was a crash—a boiling, seething explosion as of a torpedo in the river at hid feet, and forth came the Dinosaur's bride : ,\ monstrous being, much like himself, •hough somewhat smaller. " Ah, my dear, back again ? " he exclaimed, and, smashing off the palm-tree like cabbage stumps, sank down beside her. " You are unhappy, my own Bionto," she said, with the pretty solicitude of a young wife. "Not unhappy, merely thoughtful, my love. This good world—the lakes and rivei'3, the trees and grooves of club mossesall ; I sometimes think it can hardly have been created for us." " Not for us! " " N'ot for us and our friends alone. Perhaps some day something greater, \vi:er f better even than lirontosaurus Exeelsus may browse here, and swim these river::, and lift its head to the sun." '• This is mere moonshine, my dearest. Greater than you ! I* it possible to be greater than 100 ft. long. Is it possible to be heavier thanso tons? And, for llu-rctt, who should know your g.»»dness and wisdom better than I. No, no ; yoit let y-nu' humility run away wit!) you, u.y sweet. You an.' Hie first and best—Nature's masterpiece, her joy, . her uniuterable delight." "There's Aiiantosaurus," said Dionto dubiously. His wife frowued, and her huge lizard eyes were clouded. "There Is Atlantasaurus," she admitted, " the hulking, bloodthirsty, ignoble wretch I A thing that eats other livo creatures; a debased, degraded, distant relation—a cannibal! Nature blushes when she thinks of hiia and his kind; but we, we are upon a plane apart; we eat the green grass, tho juicy cane, the young fronds and ripe fruit of the palms ; we " A shadow hid the sun. High above the treej rose a dreadful head with eyes liko bicycle-wheels and teeth that glittered and dropped blood. '' It's Atlanto - come I " Two simultaneous splashes cast a huge column of water upwards as HrontoBaurus' and his better half vauisbed beneath that Mesozoic river. 111. Again some odd millions upon millions of years have swept by in the eternal procession of Time, and we fiud Professor Jebbway, F.R.S., &c. ( Ac., sitting disconsolate at his desk, with a review of his last monumental work in his hand. The reviewer was absolutely uninformed concerning Professor Jebbway's recondite subject; he had therefore been wise enough limply to gush and gloat through four colims of his journal, and declare that no such achievement of the human brain could be recorded since the stupendous life-work of Darwin. Mrs. Jebbway brought in a cup of tea and rated the Professor. "I'm sure that's nothing to be so precious glum about," she said. "Tho man's all butter, from start to finish. If his blessed paper mattered, it might do you some good. I read it yesterday." "It isn't that. From this gentleman, praise or blame are equally unimpoitant. Pui a little overburdened with my own limitations to-day. 1 wish I'd come later, when the world knew more." "It never will know more. It knows too much already—thanks to men like you—that is if I read the Scriptures aright." " No—we're only at the outset. A man's such an unfinished, incomplete, futile, shortlived machine. Just the dawning of a few sgnses done up in a poor, puny envelope." " We're nothing of the sort, and if you'd Duly let all this nonsense out of your and take more exercise, and study the Bible now and again for a change from Hi'.xley ind all the rest of them " J'* A puny envelope, holding nothing of •vorfh. If only a million million years w»r* oast, and I had cotne then "

"If I didn't know you," sho *nid,»" might be crosß, Surely your wife counts 1 At all events man is the greatest of created things—the first thing Nature ever made that knew it was alive—her masterpiece. And nothing greater than man will ever tread this planet. Mark my words, and read the Bible. Now drink your tea, and don't talk nonsense about puny envelopes. You're a well-nourished, good-looking and learned man, with a thousand a year. And if Nature ever uiadc anybody better and wiser anj more sensible—as a rule—l should like !>■ see him." Professor Jebbway sighed and took his tea. " Something better is hid in Time," ho said: " nothing better than yon, my dear partner, that is impossible; hut something belter far, wiser far than your humble scr* ' Tant." IV. Another round string of million years and we reach the Tliinf;. „ Tho Latest Thing reclined in its dwellinghouse of gin-is, and by slim 1 mental etfoil communicated with other thing;; afar oil and exchanged ideaw with tlieni—as we to-day by wireless telegraphy. The Latest Thing was pliable and pinlc, with a head like a vegetable marrow. His brain towered up into a oranial cavity lifted three feet above his face. Hiseyestwinkledlikediamonds. He breathed through gills, and had a mouth merely rudimentary, for he lived by smell. Upon his back were wings of gauze; and when he moved, these became invisible, and ho floated gently through tho air. The Latest Thing's wife wafted herself in from somewhere, and they communicated by their brains and eyes. " 0, if Nature would only get on ft little," said the Latest Thing. 41 1 am impatient and she is so slow. Not one of our children appear to give the least sign or evidence of advance and improvement." " I should hope not, indeed !" telegraphed back his wife. "Tho females are oxactly like me, and the males arc exactly like you—bless the little ducks I ' Improvement!' They are tho most perfect young thing! » you'll find, seek where you may." " Yet I hoped that they " 44 Your old craze. I tell you we are the ' high-water mark, the crest of the wavo, tho ultimate best, the triumph of CreationPerfection 1" But tho Latest Thing shook his huge head 1 1 it," he flashed back lu her.