Simple, clear, and
methodical, the style leaves nothing to be desired, and suggests no
wish that anything were away. An aunt called upon for more stories--and
no wonder, when she tells them so well--resolves to play the Nereid,
and takes her little ones in fancy down among the slopes and dells of
Ocean to watch the lovely growths and the strange creatures in which,
through plant and mineral, or what seem such, Life is yearning upward
toward the higher individuality of Volition. She tells us (for we
seemed among her hearers as we read, and drew our stool nearer) all
about the sea-anemones and corals, the coral-reefs, the jelly-fishes,
star-fishes, and sea-urchins,--which last are not to be confounded with
the buoys so frequently to be met with in our harbors. That the stories
have the sanction of Agassiz is warrant of their scientific accuracy,
while the feminine grace with which they are told is a science to be
learned of no professor.
Since the fairies are all dead, it is pleasant to know that Pan can be
brought to life again for children by the study of Nature.
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