Part 26

"The fears with which he at first inspired us having subsided, we were able to examine him attentively. I estimate, that his length is at least twice that of my schooner, that is to say, 130 feet; his head is full twelve or fourteen; the diameter of the body below the neck, is not less than six feet; the size of the head is in proportion to that of the body. He is of a blackish colour, his ear-holes, (ornes,) are about twelve feet from the extremity of his head. In short, the whole has a terrible look. When he coils himself up, he places his tail in such a manner, that it aids him in darting forward with great force: he moves in all directions with the greatest facility and astonishing rapidity.

(Signed,) "Joseph Woodward."

"_Hingham_, May 12, 1818."

This declaration is attested by Peter Holmes and John Mayo, who made affidavit of the truth of it before a justice of peace.

On the FASCINATING POWER OF SERPENTS.--Major Alexander Garden, of South Carolina, has, in a paper read to the New York Historical Society, attributed the supposed power of fascination possessed by serpents, to a vapour which they can spread around them, and to objects at a little distance, at pleasure. He first reduces the exaggerated idea which has been entertained of this power, and then adduces instances of the effect of a sickening and stupifying vapour, perceived to issue from the animal. A negro is mentioned, who, from a very peculiar acuteness in smell, could discover the rattlesnake at a distance of two hundred feet, when in the exercise of this power; and on following this indication, always found some animal suffering from its influence.

We shall now give some curiosities respecting Worms; and first, of THE CATERPILLAR.--The larvæ of butterflies are universally known by the name of caterpillars, and are extremely various in their forms and colours, some being smooth, others beset with either simple or ramified spines, and some are observed to protrude from their front, when disturbed, a pair of short tentacula, or feelers, somewhat analogous to those of a snail. A caterpillar, when grown to its full size, retires to some convenient spot, and, securing itself properly by a small quantity of silken filaments, either suspends itself by the tail, hanging with its head downwards, or else in an upright position, with the body fastened round the middle by a number of filaments. It then casts off the caterpillar-skin, and commences chrysalis, in which state it continues till the butterfly is ready for birth, which, liberating itself from the skin of the chrysalis, remains till its wings, which are at first short, weak, and covered with moisture, are fully extended; this happens in about a quarter of an hour, when the animal suddenly quits the state of inactivity to which it had been so long confined, and becomes at pleasure an inhabitant of the air.

It will now be proper to give some account of THE CATERPILLAR-EATERS.--Caterpillar-eaters are a species of worms bred in the body of the caterpillar, and which eat its flesh. These are produced by a certain kind of fly, that lodges her eggs in the body of this insect; and they, after their proper changes, become flies like their parents. Mr. Reaumur has given us, in his History of Insects, some very curious particulars respecting these little worms. Each of them spins itself a very beautiful case, of a cylindric figure, of a very strong sort of silk, in which this animal spends its state of chrysalis; and they have a mark by which they may be known from all other animal productions of this kind, which is, that they have always a broad stripe or band surrounding their middle, which is black when the rest of the case is white, and white when that is black. Mr. Reaumur has had the patience to find out the reason of this singularity. The whole shell is spun of a silk produced out of the creature's body; this at first runs all white, and towards the end of the spinning turns black. The outside of the case must necessarily be formed first, as the creature works from within; consequently this is truly white all over, but it is transparent, and shews the last spun, or black silk, through it. It might be supposed that the whole inside of the shell should be black; but this is not the case: the whole is fashioned before this black silk comes; and this is employed by the creature, not to line the whole, but to fortify certain parts only; and therefore is all applied either to the middle,--or to the two ends, omitting the middle,--or a blackness at both ends, leaving the white in the middle to appear. It is not uncommon to find a sort of small cases, in garden walks, which appear to move of themselves; when these are opened, they are found to contain a small living worm. This is one of the species of these caterpillar-eaters; which, as soon as it comes out of the body of that animal, spins itself a case for its transformation, and lives in it without food till that change comes on, when it becomes a fly, like that to which it owed its birth.

In the next place we shall introduce a subject of great curiosity, well known by the name of THE SILK-WORM.--The silk-worm is a species of caterpillar, and, like it, is formed of several moveable rings, and is well furnished with feet and claws, to rest and fix itself where it pleases. It has two rows of teeth, which do not move upwards and downwards, but from right to left, which enables it to press, cut, and tear the leaves in every direction. Along the whole length of its back we perceive through its skin a vessel which performs the functions of a heart. On each side of this insect are nine orifices, which answer to as many lungs, and assist the circulation of the chyle, or nutritive juice. Under the mouth it has a kind of reel with two holes, through which pass two drops of the gum with which its bag is filled; they act like two distaffs, continually furnishing it with the materials of which it makes its silk. The gum which distils through the two holes takes their form, lengthens into a double thread, which suddenly loses the fluidity of the liquid gum, and acquires the consistence necessary to support or to envelope the worm. When that time arrives, it joins the two threads together, by gluing them one over the other with its fore feet. This double thread is not only very fine, but also very strong, and of great length. Each bag has a thread which is nearly five hundred ells long; and as this thread is double, and joined together throughout its length, each bag will be found to contain a thousand ells of silk, though the whole weight does not exceed two grains and a half.

The life of this insect in its vermiform state is very short, and it passes through different states till it gradually arrives at its greatest degree of perfection. When it first emerges from the egg, it is extremely small, perfectly black, and its head of a still brighter black than the rest of its body: in a few days it begins to grow white, or of an ash colour; its coat becomes dirty and ruffled; it casts it off, and appears in a new dress; it becomes larger and much whiter, though a little tinged with green, from feeding upon green leaves. After a few more days (the length of time varying according to the degree of heat and quality of its nourishment) it ceases to eat, and sleeps for about two days; it then agitates and frets itself extremely, becoming red with the efforts it makes; its skin wrinkles and shrivels up, and it throws it off a second time, together with its feet. Within the space of three weeks or a month, we see it fresh dressed three times. It now begins to eat again, and might be taken for a different creature, so much is the appearance of its head, colour, and figure, altered. After continuing to eat for some days, it falls again into a lethargic state; on recovering from which, it once more changes its coat, which makes the third since it issued from its shell. It continues to eat for some time, then, entirely ceasing to take any nutriment, prepares for itself a retreat, and draws out a silken thread, which it wraps round its body in the same manner as we might wind thread round an oval piece of wood. It remains quietly in the bag it has formed, and at the end of fifteen days would pierce it, to issue forth, if it was not killed by being exposed to the heat of the sun, or shut up in an oven. The silk-bags are thrown into hot water, and stirred about with birch twigs to draw out the heads or beginning of the threads, and the silk is afterwards wound upon reels made for the purpose. Thus we are indebted to this little insect for our greatest luxury in clothing: a reflection which ought to humble our pride; for how can we be vain of the silk which covers us, when we reflect to what we are indebted for it, and how little we are instrumental in the formation of those beauties in our clothing, of which we are vain? Thus we find the most insignificant and despicable objects are the instruments of ornament and advantage to man; an insect that we scarcely condescended to look at, becomes a blessing to thousands of human beings, forms an important article of trade, and is the source of great riches.

Our next subject is, THE TAPE-WORM.--This genus of worms is destined to feed on the juices of various animals, and they inhabit the internal parts of almost every species of living beings. The structure and physiology of the tænia are curious, and it may be amusing as well as instructive to consider it with attention. The tænia appears destined to feed upon such juices of animals as are already animalized; and it is therefore most commonly found in the alimentary canal, and in the upper part, where there is the greatest abundance of chyle, for chyle seems to be the natural food of the tænia. As it is thus supported by food which is already digested, it is destitute of the complicated organs of digestion. As the tænia solium is most frequent in this country, it may be proper to describe it more particularly.

It is from three to thirty feet long; some say sixty feet. It is composed of a head, in which are a mouth adapted to drink up fluids, and an apparatus for giving the head a fixed situation. The body is composed of a great number of distinct pieces articulated together, each joint having an organ by which it attaches itself to the neighbouring part of the inner court of the intestine. The joints nearest the head are always small, and they become gradually enlarged as they are farther removed from it; but towards the tail a few of the last joints again become diminished in size. The extremity of the body is terminated by a small semicircular joint, which has no opening in it.

The head of this animal is composed of the same kind of materials as the other parts of its body; it has a rounded opening at its extremity, which is considered to be its mouth. This opening is continued by a short duct into two canals; these canals pass round every joint of the animal's body, and convey the aliment. Surrounding the opening of the mouth, are placed a number of projecting radii, which are of a fibrous texture, and whose direction is longitudinal. These radii appear to serve the purpose of tentacula, for fixing the orifice of the mouth, from their being inserted along the brim of that opening. After the rounded extremity or head has been narrowed into the neck, the lower part becomes flatted, and has two small tubercles placed on each flatted side; the tubercles are concave in the middle, and appear destined to serve the purpose of suckers, for attaching the head more effectually. The internal structure of the joints composing the body of this animal is partly vascular and partly cellular; the substance itself is white, and somewhat resembles in its texture the coagulated lymph of the human blood. The alimentary canal passes along each side of the animal, sending a cross canal over the bottom of each joint, which connects the two lateral canals together.

Mr. Carlisle injected, with a coloured size, at a single push with a small syringe, three feet in length of these canals, in the direction from the mouth downwards. He tried the injection the contrary way, but it seemed to be stopped with valves. The alimentary canal is impervious at the extreme joint, where it terminates without any opening analogous to an anus. Each joint has a vascular joint occupying the middle part, which is composed of a longitudinal canal, from which a great number of lateral canals branch off at right angles. These canals contain a fluid like milk.

The tænia seems to be one of the simplest vascular animals in nature. The way in which it is nourished is singular; the food being taken in by the mouth, passes into the alimentary canal, and is thus made to visit in a general way the different parts of the animal. As it has no excretory ducts, it would appear that the whole of its alimentary fluid is fit for nourishment; the decayed parts probably dissolve into a fluid, which transudes through the skin, which is extremely porous.

This animal has nothing resembling a brain or nerves, and seems to have no organs of sense, but those of touch. It is most probably propagated by ova, which may easily pass along the circulating vessels of other animals. We cannot otherwise explain the phenomena of worms being found in the eggs of fowls, and in the intestines of a foetus before birth, except by supposing their ova to have passed through the circulating vessels of the mother, and by this means to have been conveyed to the foetus.

The chance of an ovum being placed in a situation where it will be hatched, and the young find convenient subsistence, must be very small; hence the necessity for their being very prolific. If they had the same powers of fecundity which they now possess, and their ova were afterwards very readily hatched, then the multiplication of these animals would be immense, and become a nuisance to the other parts of the creation.

Another mode of increase allowed to tænia, (if we may call it increase,) is by an addition to the number of their joints. If we consider the individual joints as distinct beings, it is so; and when we reflect upon the power of individuality given to each joint, it makes this conjecture the more probable. We can hardly suppose that an ovum of a tænia, which at its full growth is thirty feet long, and composed of four hundred joints, contained a young tænia composed of this number of pieces; but we have seen young tænia not half a foot long, and not possessed of fifty joints, which still were entire worms. We have also many reasons to believe, that when a part of this animal is broken off from the rest, it is capable of forming a head for itself, and of becoming an independent being. The simple construction of the head makes its regeneration a much more easy operation than that of the tails and feet of lizards, which are composed of bones and complicated vessels; but this last operation has been proved by the experiments of Spallanzani, and many other naturalists.

An article of great curiosity is, THE SHIP-WORM.--This worm has a very slender, smooth, cylindrical shell; it inhabits the Indian seas, whence it was imported into Europe. It penetrates easily into the stoutest oak planks, and produces dreadful destruction to the ships, by the holes it makes in their sides: and it is to avoid the effects of this insect that vessels require sheathing.

The head of this creature is coated with a strong armour, and furnished with a mouth like that of the leech. A little above this it has two horns, which seem a kind of continuation of the shell; the neck is furnished with several strong muscles; the rest of the body is only covered by a very thin transparent skin, through which the motion of the intestines is plainly seen by the naked eye. This creature is wonderfully minute when newly excluded from the egg, but it grows to the length of four or six inches, and sometimes more. When the bottom of a vessel, or any piece of wood which is constantly under water, is inhabited by these worms, it is full of small holes; but no damage appears till the outer parts are cut away. Then their shelly habitations come into view, in which there is a large space for inclosing the animal, and surrounding it with water. There is an evident care in these creatures never to injure each other's habitations; by which means each case or shell is preserved entire. These worms will appear, on a very little consideration, to be most important beings in the great chain of creation, and pleasing demonstrations of the infinitely wise and gracious Power, which formed, and still preserves the whole, in such wonderful order and beauty; for if it were not for the rapacity of these and such animals, tropical rivers, and indeed the ocean itself, would be choked with the bodies of trees which are annually carried down by the rapid torrents, as many of them would last for ages, and probably be productive of evils, of which, happily, we cannot in the present state of things form any idea; whereas, being consumed by these animals, they are more easily broken in pieces by the waves; and the fragments which are not devoured become specifically lighter, and are consequently more readily and more effectually thrown on shore, where the sun, wind, insects, and various other instruments, speedily promote their entire dissolution.

We shall conclude this chapter with an account of a singular curiosity that was found in a colliery. It is A LIVING LIZARD, IMBEDDED IN COAL.--This animal, preserved in spirits, is now in the possession of Mr. James Scholes, engineer to Mr. Fenton's colliery, near Wakefield. It is about five inches long; its back of a dark brown colour, and it appears rough and scaly; its sides are of a lighter colour, and spotted with yellow; the belly yellow, streaked with bands of the same colour as the back. Mr. S. related to me the following circumstances of its being found. In August last, they were sinking a new pit or shaft, and after passing through measures of stone, gray-bind, and blue stone, and some thin beds of coal, to the depth of one hundred and fifty yards, they came upon that intended to be worked, which is about four feet thick. When they had excavated about three inches of it, one of the miners (as he supposed) struck his pick, or mattock, into a crevice, and shattered the coal around into small pieces; he then discovered the animal in question, and immediately carried it to Mr. S.: it continued very brisk and lively for about ten minutes, then drooped and died. About four inches above the coal in which the animal was found, numbers of muscle-shells, in a fossil state, lay scattered in a loose gray earth.

CHAP. XIX.

CURIOSITIES RESPECTING BIRDS.

_The Common Peacock--The Egyptian Vulture--The Secretary Vulture--The Stork--The Great Pelican--The Bird of Paradise--The Ostrich--The Mocking-Bird of America--The Social Grosbeak--The Bengal Grosbeak--The Humming-Bird--The Golden Eagle._

THE PEACOCK.

How rich the peacock! what bright glories run From plume to plume, and vary in the sun! He proudly spreads them to the golden ray, And gives his colours to adorn the day; With conscious state the spacious round displays, And slowly moves amid the waving blaze. _Young._

This very beautiful and interesting bird has a compressed crest and solitary spurs. It is about the size of a turkey; the length from the top of the bill to the end of the tail being three feet eight inches. The bill is nearly two inches long, and is of a brown colour. The irides are yellow. On the crown there is a sort of crest, composed of twenty-four feathers, not webbed, except at the ends, which are gilded green. The shafts are of a whitish colour; and the head, neck, and breast, are of a green gold colour. Over the eye there is a streak of white, and beneath there is the same. The back and rump are of a green gold colour, glossed over with copper; the feathers are distinct, and lie over each other like shells. Above the tail springs an inimitable set of long beautiful feathers, adorned with a variegated eye at the end of each; these reach considerably beyond the tail, and the longest of them in many birds are four feet and a half long. This beautiful train, or tail, as it is improperly called, may be expanded in the manner of a fan, at the will of the bird. The true tail is hid beneath this group of feathers, and consists of eighteen gray-brown feathers, one foot and a half long, marked on the sides with rufous gray; the scapulars, and lesser wing coverts, are reddish cream colour, variegated with black; the middle coverts deep blue, glossed with green gold; the greatest and bastard wing, rufous; the quills are also rufous, some of them variegated with rufous, blackish, and green; the belly and vent are greenish black, the thighs yellowish, the legs stout, those of the male furnished with a strong spur, three-quarters of an inch in length, the colour of which is gray-brown.

These birds, now so common in Europe, are of Eastern origin. They are found wild in the islands of Ceylon and Java, in the East Indies; and at St. Helena, Barbuda, and other West India islands. They are not natural to China; but they are found in many places in Asia and Africa. They are, however, no where so large or so fine as in India, in the neighbourhood of the Ganges, whence they have spread into all parts, increasing in a wild state in the warmer climates, but requiring care in the colder regions. In ours, this species does not come to its full plumage till the third year. The female lays five or six grayish white eggs; in hot climates twenty, the size of those of a turkey. These, if let alone, she lays in some secret place, at distance from the usual resort, to prevent their being broken by the male, which he is apt to do if he find them. The time of sitting is from twenty-seven to thirty days. The young may be fed with curds, chopped leeks, barley-meal, &c. moistened; and they are fond of grasshoppers, and some other insects. In five or six months they will feed as the old ones, on wheat and barley, with what else they can pick up in the circuit of their confinement. They seem to prefer the most elevated places to roost on during the night; such as high trees, tops of houses, and the like. Their cry is loud and inharmonious,--a perfect contrast to their external beauty. They are caught in India, by carrying lights to the trees where they roost, and having painted representations of the bird presented to them at the same time; when they put out the neck to look at the figure, the sportsman slips a noose over the head, and secures his game. In most ages they have been esteemed a salutary food. Hortensius gave the example at Rome, where it was counted the highest luxury, and sold dear, and a young peacock is thought a dainty, even in the present times. The life of these birds is reckoned by some at about twenty-five years; by others a hundred.