a pith; and secondly, because Horns and Feathers, and Porcupine's
Quils, and Cats Bristles, and the long hairs of Horses, which come very
neer the nature of a mans hair, seem all of them to have a kind of pith,
and some of them to be porous, yet I think it not (in these cases, where we
have such helps for the sense as the _Microscope_ affords) safe concluding
or building on more then we sensibly know, since we may, with examining,
find that Nature does in the make of the same kind of substance, often vary
her method in framing of it: Instances enough to confirm this we may find
in the Horns of several creatures: as what a vast difference is there
between the Horns of an Oxe, and those of some sorts of Staggs as to their
shape? and even in the hairs of several creatures, we find a vast
difference, as the hair of a man's head seems, as I said before, long,
_Cylindrical_ and sometime a little _Prismatical_, solid or impervious, and
very small; the hair of an _Indian_ Deer (a part of the middle of which is
described in the third Figure of the fifth _Scheme_, marked with F) is
bigger in compass through all the middle of it, then the Bristle of an
Hogg, but the end of it is smaller then the hair of any kind of Animal (as
may be seen by the Figure G) the whole belly of it, which is about two or
three Inches long, looks to the eye like a thread of course Canvass, that
has been newly unwreath'd, it being all wav'd or bended to and fro, much
after that manner, but through the _Microscope_, it appears all perforated
from side to side, and Spongie, like a small kind of spongy Coral, which is
often found upon the _English_ shores; but though I cut it transversly, I
could not perceive that it had any pores that ran the long-way of the hair:
the long hairs of Horses CC and D, seem _Cylindrical_ and somewhat pithy;
the Bristles of a Cat B, are conical and pithy: the Quils of Porcupines and
Hedghoggs, being cut transversly, have a whitish pith, in the manner of a
Starr, or Spur-rowel: Piggs-hair (A) is somewhat _triagonal_, and seems to
have neither pith nor pore: And other kinds of hair have quite a differing
structure and form. And therefore I think it no way agreeable to a true
natural Historian, to pretend to be so sharp-sighted, as to see what a
pre-conceiv'd _Hypothesis_ tells them should be there, where another man,
though perhaps as seeing, but not forestall'd, can discover no such matter.

But to proceed; I observ'd several kind