That lesser light which rules the night, the silver moon, not only serves to inspire poets and artists, and to light so many otherwise dark hours, but with mysterious attraction controls the tide in ebb and flow. After our brief glance at the solar system, we have learned, by means of fossils hidden in the rocks, something of the wonderful progress of life through all the earth-building ages. As we have traced this slow ascent of life from its far-off, simple beginning, we have found that the first home of life was the ocean. When the world was wrapped in a mantle of seas, before the first continent thrust its rocky ridges above the waves, no doubt those warm waves swarmed with busy life. “The waters brought forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life”; and to-day, as in all previous ages, the sea is the headquarters and busy home of living things. In every zone the waters teem with animal organisms, so numerous that we doubt whether the sands on the shores, or the stars that fill space equal them for multitude. After the survey of some of the vanished fauna that peopled the earth in past epochs, the next step suggested is to make acquaintance with yet remaining animal life, such as is more nearly related to extinct species than to any other surviving families. There are even now animals more or less common, that have altered little in the slow lapse of ages, and have their nearest affinities with fossil types. Such an one we have found in that most venerable of crustaceans, the limulus, or king crab! Coming into creation some thousands or even some hundreds of thousands of years later than the crustaceans, the reptiles have left one of their early representatives, a conservative which has adapted itself to no new fashions, accommodated itself to no living species, but maintained its integrity as a near relation of a family of fossil lizards, whose remains are found in England near Warwick, in Scotland at Elgin, in Central India, and in South Africa, indicating that in their palmy days they were citizens of the world, widely spread, numerous, and nicely adjusted to the conditions of their age. This scion of a most ancient family whom we now introduce, claiming for it the regard due to long lineage, is named the sphenodon, or hatteria. At present the hatteria holds aloof from general society, and unless forced to exhibit in zoological gardens, confines itself to a very limited haunt in New Zealand. In New Zealand a score or two of years ago, the hatteria crawled about with the slowness proper to long years and high dignity, and enjoyed a numerous family and a comfortable independence. Behold him, then, honorably divested of foolish pride in his pedigree, but carefully adhering to all the manners and traditions of his venerable line.