To be oneself, oneself alone, in a little complete world, was a great temptation for all. A universal seduction! a beautiful folly, which causes all the effort and all the progress of the world, from our earth upward to the very stars. But in her first attempts the Medusa, seems especially unjustified. One would say that she was created on purpose to be drowned. Laden above, and ill-ballasted below, she is formed in conditions exactly opposite to those of her parent, the Physalie. This latter displays on the surface of the water, only a little balloon, an insubmersible membrane and below has infinitely long tentaculæ, of twenty feet or more, which steady her, sweep the waters, stupefy the fish, make prey of him. Light and careless, inflating her pearly balloon of blue or purple tints, she darts from her long hairy tentaculæ a subtle and murderous poison. Less formidable, the Velelles are no less secure. They have the form of _radeaux_, their minute organization is already somewhat solid, and they can steer and trim their oblique sail to every wind. The Porpites, that seem to be only a flower, a sea Margaret, have their own peculiar levity; even after death, they continue to float. It is the same with many other fantastic and almost aërial beings, garlands with golden bells or with rosebuds--such as the Physopheres, Stephanomie, &c., azure girdles of Venus. All these swim and float invincibly, fear only the shore, and sail boldly out on the open sea, and when it is ever so rough are perfectly safe there. So little do the Porpites and Velelles fear the sea, that, being able to rise at pleasure, they exert themselves to sink to the concealing depths when the weather is bad. Not such is our poor Medusa. Fearing the shore, she is also in danger at sea. She could sink into the depths at will, but the watery abyss is forbidden to her; she can live only on the surface, in the broad light and in full peril. She sees, she hears, and her sense of touch is very delicate, to her misfortune, too much so. She cannot guide herself; her most complicated organs overload and overbalance her. And so we are tempted to believe that she must needs repent of so perilous a search after liberty; and desires to be back in the inferior state, the security of the common life. The polypier made the Medusa, she in turn makes the polypier, and returns to the life of community. But this vegetating state wearies her, and in the next generation she again emancipates herself and goes forth again to the perils of her vain navigation. Strange alternation, in which she floats incessantly; moving, she dreams of repose; in rest, she sighs for movement.