`How curious it seems,' remarked Ernest, `that God should create hurtful animals like this.'
`To our feeble and narrow vision many of the ways of the Infinite and Eternal Mind are incomprehensible,' I replied. `What our limited reason cannot grasp, let us be content to acknowledge as the workings of Almighty power and wisdom, and thankfully trust in that "Rock," which, were it not higher than we, would afford no sense of security to the immortal soul.
`That animals should prey upon one another is a means of preserving a due balance in the world of nature. What beautiful and warm furs are procured by hunters just in those countries where no other covering would defend the inhabitants from the wintery cold!—As, for instance, the skins of bears, wolverines, and arctic foxes, wild cats, and
