Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) by Various

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Worms prepare the ground in an excellent manner for the growth of
fibrous-rooted plants and for seedlings of all kinds. They
periodically expose the mould to the air, and sift it so that no
stones larger than the particles which they can swallow are left in
it. They mingle the whole intimately together, like a gardener who
prepares fine soil for his choicest plants. In this state it is well
fitted to retain moisture and to absorb all soluble substances, as
well as for the process of nitrification. The bones of dead animals,
the harder parts of insects, the shells of land mollusks, leaves,
twigs, etc., are before long all buried beneath the accumulated
castings of worms, and are thus brought in a more or less decayed
state within reach of the roots of plants. Worms likewise drag an
infinite number of dead leaves and other parts of plants into their
burrows, partly for the sake of plugging them up and partly as food.

The leaves which are dragged into the burrows as food, after being
torn into the finest shreds, partially digested and saturated with the
intestinal and urinary secretions, are commingled with much earth.
This earth forms the dark-colored, rich humus which almost everywhere
covers the surface of the land with a fairly well-defined layer or
mantle. Von Hensen placed two worms in a vessel eighteen inches in
diameter, which was filled with sand, on which fallen leaves were
strewed; and these were soon dragged into their burrows to a depth of
three inches. After about six weeks an almost uniform layer of sand, a
centimetre (.4 inch) in thickness, was converted into humus by having
passed through the alimentary canals of these two worms. It is
believed by some persons that worm-burrows, which often penetrate the
ground almost perpendicularly to a depth of five or six feet,
materially aid in its drainage; notwithstanding that the viscid
castings piled over the mouths of the burrows prevent or check the
rain-water directly entering them. They allow the air to penetrate
deeply into the ground. They also greatly facilitate the downward
passage of roots of moderate size; and these will be nourished by the
humus with which the burrows are lined. Many seeds owe their
germination to having been covered by castings; and others buried to a
considerable depth beneath accumulated castings lie dormant, until at
some future time they are accidentally uncovered and germinate.

[Illustration: A WORM CASTING FROM SOUTH INDIA. (Natural Size.)]

Worms are poorly provided with sense-organs, for they cannot be said
to see, although they can just distinguish between light and darkness;
they are completely deaf, and have only a feeble power of smell; the
sense of touch alone is well developed. They can, therefore, learn
little about the outside world, and it is surprising that they should
exhibit some skill in lining their burrows with their castings and
with leaves, and in the case of some species in piling up their
castings into tower-like constructions. But it is far more surprising
that they should apparently exhibit some degree of intelligence
instead of a mere blind, instinctive impulse, in their manner of
plugging up the mouths of their burrows. They act in nearly the same
manner as would a man, who had to close a cylindrical tube with
different kinds of leaves, petioles, triangles of paper, etc., for
they commonly seize such objects by their pointed ends. But with thin
objects a certain number are drawn in by their broader ends. They do
not act in the same unvarying manner in all cases, as do most of the
lower animals; for instance, they do not drag in leaves by their
foot-stalks, unless the basil part of the blade is as narrow as the
apex, or narrower than it.

* * * * *

When we behold a wide, turf-covered expanse, we should remember that
its smoothness, on which so much of its beauty depends, is mainly due
to all the inequalities having been slowly levelled by worms. It is a
marvellous reflection that the whole of the superficial mould over any
such expanse has passed, and will again pass, every few years through
the bodies of worms. The plough is one of the most ancient and most
valuable of man's inventions; but long before he existed the land was
in fact regularly ploughed, and, still continues to be thus ploughed
by earth-worms. It may be doubted whether there are many other animals
which have played so important a part in the history of the world, as
have these lowly organized creatures. Some other animals, however,
still more lowly organized, namely, corals, have done far more
conspicuous work in having constructed innumerable reefs and islands
in the great oceans; but these are almost confined to the tropical
zones.

[Illustration]

ZOOeLOGICAL MYTHS

(FROM FACTS AND FICTIONS OF ZOOeLOGY.)

BY ANDREW WILSON.

[Illustration]

When the country swain, loitering along some lane, comes to a
standstill to contemplate, with awe and wonder, the spectacle of a
mass of the familiar "hair-eels" or "hair-worms" wriggling about in a
pool, he plods on his way firmly convinced that, as he has been taught
to believe, he has just witnessed the results of the transformation of
some horse's hairs into living creatures. So familiar is this belief
to people of professedly higher culture than the countryman, that the
transformation just alluded to has to all, save a few thinking persons
and zooelogists, become a matter of the most commonplace kind. When
some quarrymen, engaged in splitting up the rocks, have succeeded in
dislodging some huge mass of stone, there may sometimes be seen to hop
from among the debris a lively toad or frog, which comes to be
regarded by the excavators with feelings akin to those of
superstitious wonder and amazement. The animal may or may not be
captured; but the fact is duly chronicled in the local newspapers, and
people wonder for a season over the phenomenon of a veritable Rip Van
Winkle of a frog, which to all appearance, has lived for "thousands of
years in the solid rock." Nor do the hair-worm and the frog stand
alone in respect of their marvellous origin. Popular zooelogy is full
of such marvels. We find unicorns, mermaids, and mermen; geese
developed from the shell-fish known as "barnacles"; we are told that
crocodiles may weep, and that sirens can sing--in short, there is
nothing so wonderful to be told of animals that people will not
believe the tale. Whilst, curiously enough, when they are told of
veritable facts of animal life, heads begin to shake and doubts to be
expressed, until the zooelogist despairs of educating people into
distinguishing fact from fiction, and truth from theories and
unsupported beliefs. The story told of the old lady, whose youthful
acquaintance of seafaring habits entertained her with tales of the
wonders he had seen, finds, after all, a close application in the
world at large. The dame listened with delight, appreciation, and
belief, to accounts of mountains of sugar and rivers of rum, and to
tales of lands where gold and silver and precious stones were more
than plentiful. But when the narrator descended to tell of fishes that
were able to raise themselves out of the water in flight, the old
lady's credulity began to fancy itself imposed upon; for she
indignantly repressed what she considered the lad's tendency to
exaggeration, saying, "Sugar mountains may be, and rivers of rum may
be, but fish that flee ne'er can be!" Many popular beliefs concerning
animals partake of the character of the old lady's opinions regarding
the real and fabulous; and the circumstance tells powerfully in favor
of the opinion that a knowledge of our surroundings in the world, and
an intelligent conception of animal and plant life, should form part
of the school-training of every boy and girl, as the most effective
antidote to superstitions and myths of every kind.

[Illustration: FLYING FISH.]

The tracing of myths and fables is a very interesting task, and it
may, therefore, form a curious study, if we endeavor to investigate
very briefly a few of the popular and erroneous beliefs regarding
lower animals. The belief regarding the origin of the hair-worms is
both widely spread and ancient. Shakespeare tells us that

"Much, is breeding
Which, like the courser's hair, hath, yet but life,
And not a serpent's poison."

The hair-worms certainly present the appearance of long, delicate
black hairs, which move about with great activity amidst the mud of
pools and ditches. These worms, in the early stages of their
existence, inhabit the bodies of insects, and may be found coiled up
within the grasshopper, which thus gives shelter to a guest exceeding
many times the length of the body of its host. Sooner or later the
hair-worm, or _Gordius aquaticus_ as the naturalist terms it, leaves
the body of the insect, and lays its eggs, fastened together in long
strings, in water. From each egg a little creature armed with minute
hooks is produced, and this young hair-worm burrows its way into the
body of some insect, there to repeat the history of its parent. Such
is the well-ascertained history of the hair-worm, excluding entirely
the popular belief in its origin. There certainly does exist in
science a theory known as that of "spontaneous generation," which, in
ancient times, accounted for the production of insects and other
animals by assuming that they were produced in some mysterious fashion
out of lifeless matter. But not even the most ardent believer in the
extreme modification of this theory which holds a place in modern
scientific belief, would venture to maintain the production of a
hair-worm by the mysterious vivification of an inert substance such as
a horse's hair.

The expression "crocodile's tears" has passed into common use, and it
therefore may be worth while noting the probable origin of this myth.
Shakespeare, with that wide extent of knowledge which enabled him to
draw similes from every department of human thought, says that

"Gloster's show
Beguiles him, as the mournful crocodile
With sorrow snares relenting passengers."

The poet thus indicates the belief that not only do crocodiles shed
tears, but that sympathizing passengers, turning to commiserate the
reptile's woes, are seized and destroyed by the treacherous creatures.
That quaint and credulous old author--the earliest writer of English
prose--Sir John Mandeville, in his "Voiage," or account of his
"Travile," published about 1356--in which, by the way, there are to be
found accounts of not a few wonderful things in the way of zooelogical
curiosities--tells us that in a certain "contre and be all yonde, ben
great plenty of Crokodilles, that is, a manner of a long Serpent as I
have seyed before." He further remarks that "these Serpents slew men,"
and devoured them, weeping; and he tells us, too, that "whan thei
eaten thei meven (move) the over jowe (upper jaw), and nought the
nether (lower) jowe: and thei have no tonge (tongue)." Sir John thus
states two popular beliefs of his time and of days prior to his age,
namely, that crocodiles move their upper jaws, and that a tongue was
absent in these animals.

[Illustration: CROCODILE.]

As regards the tears of the crocodile, no foundation of fact exists
for the belief in such sympathetic exhibitions. But a highly probable
explanation may be given of the manner in which such a belief
originated. These reptiles unquestionably emit very loud and
singularly plaintive cries, compared by some travellers to the
mournful howling of dogs. The earlier and credulous travellers would
very naturally associate tears with these cries, and, once begun, the
supposition would be readily propagated, for error and myth are ever
plants of quick growth. The belief in the movement of the upper jaw
rests on apparent basis of fact. The lower jaw is joined to the skull
very far back on the latter, and the mouth-opening thus comes to be
singularly wide; whilst, when the mouth opens, the skull and upper jaw
are apparently observed to move. This is not the case, however; the
apparent movement arising from the manner in which the lower jaw and
the skull are joined together. The belief in the absence of the tongue
is even more readily explained. When the mouth is widely opened, no
tongue is to be seen. This organ is not only present, but is,
moreover, of large size; it is, however, firmly attached to the floor
of the mouth, and is specially adapted, from its peculiar form and
structure, to assist these animals in the capture and swallowing of
their prey.

One of the most curious fables regarding animals which can well be
mentioned, is that respecting the so-called "Bernicle" or "Barnacle
Geese," which by the naturalists and educated persons of the Middle
Ages were believed to be produced by those little Crustaceans named
"Barnacles." With the "Barnacles" every one must be familiar who has
examined the floating driftwood of the sea-beach, or who has seen
ships docked in a seaport town. A barnacle is simply a kind of crab
enclosed in a triangular shell, and attached by a fleshy stalk to
fixed objects. If the barnacle is not familiar to readers, certain
near relations of these animals must be well known, by sight at least,
as amongst the most familiar denizens of our sea-coast. These latter
are the "Sea-Acorn," or Balani, whose little conical shells we crush
by hundreds as we walk over the rocks at low-water mark; whilst every
wooden pile immersed in the sea becomes coated in a short time with a
thick crust of the "Sea-Acorns." If we place one of these little
animals, barnacle, or sea-acorn--the latter wanting the stalk of the
former--in its native waters, we shall observe a beautiful little
series of feathery plumes to wave backward and forward, and ever and
anon to be quickly withdrawn into the secure recesses of the shell.
These organs are the modified feet of the animal, which not only serve
for sweeping food-particles into the mouth, but act also as
breathing-organs. We may, therefore, find it a curious study to
inquire through what extraordinary transformation and confusion of
ideas such an animal could be credited with giving origin to a
veritable goose; and the investigation of the subject will also afford
a singularly apt illustration of the ready manner in which the fable
of one year or period becomes transmitted and transformed into the
secure and firm belief of the next.

We may begin our investigation by inquiring into some of the opinions
which were entertained on this subject and ventilated by certain old
writers. Between 1154 and 1189 Giraldus Cambrensis, in a work entitled
"Topographia Hiberniae," written in Latin, remarks concerning "many
birds which are called Bernacae: against nature, nature produces them
in a most extraordinary way. They are like marsh geese, but somewhat
smaller. They are produced from fir timber tossed along the sea, and
are at first like gum. Afterward they hang down by their beaks, as if
from a seaweed attached to the timber, surrounded by shells, in order
to grow more freely," Giraldus is here evidently describing the
barnacles themselves. He continues: "Having thus, in process of time,
been clothed with a strong coat of feathers, they either fall into the
water or fly freely away into the air. They derive their food and
growth from the sap of the wood or the sea, by a secret and most
wonderful process of alimentation. I have frequently, with my own
eyes, seen more than a thousand of these small bodies of birds,
hanging down on the seashore from one piece of timber, enclosed in
shells, and already formed." Here, again, our author is speaking of
the barnacles themselves, with which he naturally confuses the geese,
since he presumes the Crustaceans are simply geese in an undeveloped
state. He further informs his readers that, owing to their presumably
marine origin, "bishops and clergymen in some parts of Ireland do not
scruple to dine off these birds at the time of fasting, because they
are not flesh, nor born of flesh," although for certain other and
theological reasons, not specially requiring to be discussed in the
present instance, Giraldus disputes the legality of this practice of
the Hibernian clerics.

In the year 1527 appeared "The Hystory and Croniclis of Scotland, with
the cosmography and dyscription thairof, compilit be the noble Clerk
Maister Hector Boece, Channon of Aberdene." Boece's "History" was
written in Latin; the title we have just quoted being that of the
English version of the work (1540), which title further sets forth
that Boece's work was "Translait laitly in our vulgar and commoun
langage be Maister Johne Bellenden, Archedene of Murray, And
Imprentit in Edinburgh, be me Thomas Davidson, prenter to the Kyngis
nobyll grace." In this learned work the author discredits the popular
ideas regarding the origin of the geese. "Some men belevis that thir
clakis (geese) growis on treis be the nebbis (bills). Bot thair
opinoun is vane. And becaus the nature and procreatioun of thir clakis
is strange, we have maid na lytyll laboure and deligence to serche ye
treuth and verite yairof, we have salit (sailed) throw ye seis quhare
thir clakis ar bred, and I fynd be gret experience, that the nature of
the seis is mair relevant caus of thair procreatioun than ony uthir
thyng." According to Boece, then, "the nature of the seis" formed the
chief element in the production of the geese, and our author proceeds
to relate how "all treis (trees) that ar casein in the seis be proces
of tyme apperis first wormeetin (worm-eaten), and in the small boris
and hollis (holes) thairof growis small worms." Our author no doubt
here alludes to the ravages of the Teredo, or ship-worm, which burrows
into timber, and with which the barnacles themselves are thus
confused. Then he continues, the "wormis" first "schaw (show) thair
heid and feit, and last of all thay schaw thair plumis and wyngis.
Finaly, quhen thay ar cumyn to the just mesure and quantite of geis,
thay fle in the aire as othir fowlis dois, as was notably provyn, in
the yeir of God ane thousand iii hundred lxxxx, in sicht of mony
pepyll, besyde the castell of Petslego." On the occasion referred to,
Boece tells us that a great tree was cast on shore, and was divided,
by order of the "laird" of the ground, by means of a saw. Wonderful to
relate, the tree was found not merely to be riddled with a "multitude
of wormis," throwing themselves out of the holes of the tree, but some
of the "wormis" had "baith heid, feit, and wyngis," but, adds the
author, "they had no fedderis (feathers)."

Unquestionably, either "the scientific use of the imagination" had
operated in this instance in inducing the observers to believe that in
this tree, riddled by the ship-worms and possibly having barnacles
attached to it, they beheld young geese; or Boece had construed the
appearances described as those representing the embryo stages of the
barnacle geese.

Boece further relates how a ship named the Christofir was brought to
Leith, and was broken down because her timbers had grown old and
failing. In these timbers were beheld the same "wormeetin"
appearances, "all the hollis thairof" being "full of geis." Boece
again most emphatically rejects the idea that the "geis" were produced
from the wood of which the timbers were composed, and once more
proclaims his belief that the "nature of the seis resolvit in geis"
may be accepted as the true and final explanation of their origin. A
certain "Maister Alexander Galloway" had apparently strolled with the
historian along the sea-coast, the former giving "his mynd with maist
ernist besynes to serche the verite of this obscure and mysty dowtis."
Lifting up a piece of tangle, they beheld the seaweed to be hanging
full of mussel-shells from the root to the branches. Maister Galloway
opened one of the mussel-shells, and was "mair astonis than afore" to
find no fish therein, but a perfectly shaped "foule, smal and gret,"
as corresponded to the "quantity of the shell." And once again Boece
draws the inference that the trees or wood on which the creatures are
found have nothing to do with the origin of the birds; and that the
fowls are begotten of the "occeane see, quhilk," concludes our author,
"is the caus and production of mony wonderful thingis."

More than fifty years after the publication of Boece's "History," old
Gerard of London, the famous "master in chirurgerie" of his day, gave
an account of the barnacle goose, and not only entered into minute
particulars of its growth and origin, but illustrated its manner of
production by means of the engraver's art of his day. Gerard's
"Herball," published in 1597, thus contains, amongst much that is
curious in medical lore, a very quaint piece of zooelogical history. He
tells us that "in the north parts of Scotland, and the Hands adjacent,
called Orchades (Orkneys)," are found "certaine trees, whereon doe
growe certaine shell fishes, of a white colour tending to russet;
wherein are conteined little living creatures: which shels in time of
maturitie doe open, and out of them grow those little living foules
whom we call Barnakles, in the north of England Brant Geese, and in
Lancashire tree Geese; but the other that do fall upon the land,
perish, and come to nothing: thus much by the writings of others, and
also from the mouths of people of those parts, which may," concludes
Gerard, "very well accord with truth."

Not content with hearsay evidence, however, Gerard relates what his
eyes saw and hands touched. He describes how on the coasts of a
certain "small Hand in Lancashire called Pile of Foulders" (probably
Peel Island), the wreckage of ships is cast up by the waves, along
with the trunks and branches "of old and rotten trees." On these
wooden rejectamenta "a certaine spume or froth" grows, according to
Gerard. This spume "in time breedeth unto certaine shels, in shape
like those of the muskle, but sharper pointed, and of a whitish
color." This description, it may be remarked, clearly applies to the
barnacles themselves. Gerard then continues to point out how, when the
shell is perfectly formed, it "gapeth open, and the first thing that
appeereth is the foresaid lace or string"--the substance described by
Gerard as contained within the shell--"next come the legs of the Birde
hanging out; and as it groweth greater, it openeth the shell by
degrees, till at length it is all come forth, and hangeth only by the
bill; in short space after it commeth to full maturitie, and falleth
into the sea, where it gathereth feathers, and groweth to a foule,
bigger than a Mallard, and lesser than a Goose, having blacke legs and
bill or beake, and feathers blacke and white ... which the people of
Lancashire call by no other name than a tree Goose."

[Illustration: FIG. 1. THE BARNACLE TREE. (From Gerard's "Herball.")]

Accompanying this description is the engraving of the barnicle tree
(Fig. 1) bearing its geese progeny. From the open shells in two cases,
the little geese are seen protruding, whilst several of the
fully-fledged fowls are disporting themselves in the sea below.
Gerard's concluding piece of information, with its exordium, must not
be omitted. "They spawne," says the wise apothecary, "as it were, in
March or Aprill; the Geese are found in Maie or June, and come to
fulnesse of feathers in the moneth after. And thus hauing, through
God's assistance, discoursed somewhat at large of Grasses, Herbes,
Shrubs, Trees, Mosses, and certaine excrescences of the earth, with
other things moe incident to the Historic thereof, we conclude and end
our present volume, with this woonder of England. For which God's name
be euer honored and praised." It is to be remarked that Gerard's
description of the goose-progeny of the barnacle tree exactly
corresponds with the appearance of the bird known to ornithologists as
the "barnacle-goose"; and there can be no doubt that, skilled as was
this author in the natural history lore of his day, there was no other
feeling in his mind than that of firm belief in and pious wonder at
the curious relations between the shells and their fowl-offspring.
Gerard thus attributes the origin of the latter to the barnacles. He
says nothing of the "wormeetin" holes and burrows so frequently
mentioned by Boece, nor would he have agreed with the latter in
crediting the "nature of the occeane see" with their production, save
in so far as their barnacle-parents lived and existed in the waters of
the ocean.

The last account of this curious fable which we may allude to in the
present instance is that of Sir Robert Moray, who, in his work
entitled "A Relation concerning Barnacles," published in the
_Philosophical Transactions_ of the Royal Society in 1677-78, gives a
succinct account of these crustaceans and their bird-progeny. Sir
Robert is described as "lately one of his Majesties Council for the
Kingdom of Scotland," and we may therefore justly assume his account
to represent that of a cultured, observant person of his day and
generation. The account begins by remarking that the "most ordinary
trees" found in the western islands of Scotland "are Firr and Ash."
"Being," continues Sir Robert, "in the Island of East (Uist), I saw
lying upon the shore a cut of a large Firr tree of about 2-1/2 foot
diameter, and 9 or 10 foot long; which had lain so long out of the
water that it was very dry: And most of the shells that had formerly
cover'd it, were worn or rubb'd off. Only on the parts that lay next
the ground, there still hung multitudes of little Shells; having
within them little Birds, perfectly shap'd, supposed to be Barnacles."
Here again the description applies to the barnacles; the "little
birds" they are described as containing being of course the bodies of
the shell-fish.

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