Full of such ideas, I addressed myself to one of the philosophers of the present day who have made the greatest and most successful use of the microscope,—the celebrated Dr. Robin. Under his direction, I purchased from the skilful optician Nachet an excellent instrument, and planted myself before my window on a very beautiful day.
I have said it,—the microscope is much more than a mere magnifying glass. It is an aid, a servant who has hands to supplement your own—eyes, and movable eyes, which by their changes enable you to see an object at a suitable magnitude, and either in detail or as a whole. One perfectly understands the all-absorbing attraction which it exercises; however great the fatigue it causes, one cannot separate one's-self from it. Its début, as we have seen, was signalized by its slaying its creator, Swammerdam. How many workmen has it not since deprived, if not of life, at least of sight? The first of the two Hubers became blind at a comparatively early age. The illustrious author of the great work on the cockchafer, M. Strauss, is nearly so. Our pallid but enthusiastic Robin is already on the same descent, but pursues his studies without pause. The seduction is too potent. Who can renounce the truth, after once beholding it? Who can willingly return into the world of errors wherein men exist? Better not to see at all, than always to see things falsely.
Behold me, then, face to face with my little man of copper. I lost not an instant in interrogating the oracle. And its first and somewhat rough reply respecting the two objects I presented was:—
One was the human hand, white and delicate,—the left hand, the idler, and that of a person who did no work.
The other, a spider's foot.
To the naked eye the former object seemed agreeable enough; the other, a tiny, obscure blade, of a dirty brown, and somewhat repulsive.
In the microscope the effect was precisely the opposite. In the spider's foot, easily cleansed of a few downy spots, appeared a magnificent comb of the most beautiful shell, which, far from being dirty, by its extreme polish was rendered incapable of being soiled; everything glided off it. This object would seem to serve two ends: that of a very delicate hand, through which the spinner, in rising or descending, suffers its thread to glide; and that of a comb, with which the attentive labourer holds its stuff, while at work, in the required position, until the woven threads—more like a cloud—grow firm and strong, are dried by the air, and no longer fall back floating and wavy, but useless.
As for the human hand, the part exposed under the microscope seemed, even with the smallest lens, a vague and immense substance, incomprehensible through its very coarseness.
Even with a medium lens, of only twelve or fifteen times magnifying power, it seemed to be a yellowish, reddish tissue, coarse and dry, ill-woven,—a kind of wiry taffeta, in which each mesh was irregularly puffed up.