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particular ufe; and what else but defign ever produces fuch? The woodpecker lives chiefly upon infects, lodged in the bodies of decayed or decaying trees. For the purpose of boring into the wood, it is furnished with a bill, ftraight, hard, angular, and fharp. When, by means of this piercer, it has reached the cells of the infects, then comes the office of its tongue; which tongue is first, of fuch a length that the bird can dart it out three or four inches from the bill, in this refpect differing greatly from every other fpecies of bird; in the second place, it is tipped with a ftiff, fharb, bony thorn; and, in the third place, which appears to me the most remarkable property of all, this tip is dentated on both fides, like the beard of an arrow or the The defcription of the part The bird, having exposed the retreats of the infects by the assistance of its bill, with a motion inconceivably quick lanches out at them this long tongue; tranffixes them upon the barbed needle at the end of it; and thus draws its prey within its mouth. If this be not mechanism, what is? Should it be faid, that, by continual endeavours to shoot out the tongue to the stretch,

barb of a hook.

declares its use.

the

the woodpecker fpecies may by degrees have lengthened the organ itself, beyond that of other birds, what account can be given of its form; of its tip? How, in particular, did it get its barbs, its dentation? These barbs, in my opinion, wherever they occur, are decifive proofs of mechanical contrivance.

III. I fhall add one more example for the fake of its novelty. It is always an agreeable discovery, when, having remarked in an ani mal an extraordinary ftructure, we come at length to find out an unexpected ufe for it. The following narrative, which Goldsmith has taken from Buffon, furnishes an instance of this kind. The babyroueffa, or Indian hog, a fpecies of wild boar found in the East Indies, has two bent teeth, more than half a yard long, growing upwards, and, which is the fingularity, from the upper jaw. These inftruments are not wanted for defence, that service being provided for by two tufks iffuing from the under jaw, and resembling those of the common boar. Nor does the animal ufe They might seem there

them for defence.

brance.

fore to be both a fuperfluity and an incumBut obferve the event. The animal bitches one of these bent upper teeth upon the

branch

branch of a tree, and then fuffers its whole body to swing from it. This is its manner of taking repose, and of confulting for its fafety. It continues the whole night fufpended by its tooth, both easy in its pofture, and fecure; being out of the reach of animals which hunt it for prey *.

*Goldfmith's Nat, Hift. vol. iii. p. 195.

J.

CHAP

CHAPTER XIV.

PROSPECTIVE CONTRIVANCES.

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I CAN hardly imagine to myself a more diftinguishing mark, and, consequently, a more certain proof of defign, than preparation, i. e. the providing of things beforehand, which are not to be used until a confiderable time afterwards; for this implies a contemplation of the future, which belongs only to intelligence.

Of these prospective contrivances the bodies of animals furnish various examples.

I. The human teeth afford an instance, not only of profpective contrivance, but of the completion of the contrivance being defignedly fufpended. They are formed within the gums, and there they ftop: the fact being, that their further advance to maturity would not only be useless to the new-born animal, but extremely in its way; as it is evident that the act of fucking, by which it is for fome time to be nourished, will be performed with more cafe both to the nurfe and to the

infant, whilft the infide of the mouth, and edges of the gums, are fmooth and soft, than if fet with hard pointed bones. By the time they are wanted, the teeth are ready. They have been lodged within the gums for fome months paft, but detained, as it were, in their fockets, fo long as their further protrufion would interfere with the office to which the mouth is destined. Nature, namely, that intelligence which was employed in creation, looked beyond the first year of the infant's life; yet, whilst she was, providing for functions. which were after that term to become néceffa'ry, was careful not to incommode those which preceded them. What renders it more probable that this is the effect of defign is, that the teeth are imperfect, whilft all other parts of the mouth are perfect. The lips are perfect, the tongue is perfect; the cheeks, the jaws, the palate, the pharynx, the larynx, are all perfect. The teeth alone are not fo. This is the fact with respect to the human mouth: the fact alfo is, that the parts above enumerated, are called into ufe from the beginning; whereas the teeth would be only fo many obstacles and annoyances, if they were there. When a contrary

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