The experimenter before mentioned was surprised to find that two
grasshoppers, one of which was three times the bulk of the other,
leaped an equal height. This was what might be expected of two animals
similarly constructed. The spring was proportioned to the bulk. In
experiments on the insects with powerful wings, such as bees, flies,
dragon-flies, etc., it was found that the weight they could bear without
being forced to descend was in most cases equal to their own. In some
cases it was more, but the inequality of rate of flight, had it been
taken into the reckoning, would have accounted for this.
Take two creatures of different bulk but built upon exactly the same
plan and proportions, say a Brobdingnagian and a Lilliputian, and let
both show their powers in the arena. Suppose the first to weigh a
million times more than the second. If the giant could raise to his
shoulder, some thirty-five feet from the ground, a weight twenty
thousand pounds, the dwarf can raise to his shoulder, not, as might be
thought, a fiftieth of a pound, but two full pounds.
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