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A NATURALIST'S NOTE-BOOK
BY
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AUTHOR OF "LEISURE-TIME STUDIES," ETC.
DLonUon
CHATTO AND WINDUS, PICCADILLY
1882
[The right of translation is reserved]
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.
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MANY PLEASANT HOURS OF FRIENDSHIP.
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PREFACE.
THE present series of sketches has been compiled chiefly because
of the existence of a growing taste on the part of the cultured
public, for a knowledge of the objects in which the naturalist
professes an interest. The papers, written under divers moods
and circumstances, possess at least the merit of variety. I have
not hesitated to include under the designation of a biologist's
studies, such diverse topics as a diatribe against the unlawful
practice of medicine, and a visit to the great emporium of wild
zoology in the East End of London. Similarly, I have regarded
as interesting enough in a general sense, and have accordingly
included in this volume two papers on the aids which Science
is prepared to give to the legal Nemesis in the pursuit of the
criminal. If the book may be found capable of imparting in
some degree a taste for hi gher natural history studies ; or if it
may succeed even in profitably whiling away the tedium of a
lengthy journey, or an hour wherein there is " nothing to do,"
I shall feel that its highest aim has been fulfilled. In this
light, I offer it respectfully to the great and appreciative
audience of which that " patient omnivore " the " general
reader " is the typical representative.
CONTENTS.
SCIENCE AND CBUIE ... ... ... ... ... 1
LOST AND MISSING ... ... ... ... 22
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS ... ... ... ... 43
AT JAMBACH'S ... ... ... ... ... 64
JELLY-PISHES ... ... ... ... ... 71
THBEADS AND THBUMS IN LOWEB LIFE ... ... 96
WHALES AND THEIB NEIGHBOUBS ... ... ... 118
FOOD AND FASTING ... ... ... ... 138
SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS ... ... ... ... ... 148
THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE- RELIC ... ... ... 159
SKATES AND KAYS ... ... ... ... ... 168
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BABKACLE ... ... 176
LEAVES ... ... ... ... ... ... 187
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY ... ... ... 194
ABOUT KANGAROOS ... ... ... ... ... 203
ON GIANTS ... ... ... ... ... ... 215
THE POLITY OF A POND . 232
LEAVES
A NATURALIST'S NOTE-BOOK
SCIENCE AND CRIME.
THE scientific study of criminals, and the philosophic study of
crimes, form not merely an interesting, but a highly warrantable
exercise of intellect. Only through some such investigation into
these subjects can a knowledge of the nature, cause, and cure of
crime be attained if, indeed, such knowledge in its perfect
phases be ever reached in human history. And only when
aided by the skilled expert the chemist, surgeon, physiologist,
or engraver and by the deductions and inductions science is
able or prepared to draw from any given set of circumstances, is
justice enabled to enter upon the pursuit of crime, and to make
her name a terror to evildoers. It is not our intention to follow,
at present, such experimenters as Mr. Francis Galton in his
remarkable researches into the conformation and configuration
of the criminal head, amongst other types of human character.
Readers interested in knowing what may be done in the way of
a scientific study of character should peruse Mr. Galton's address
to the Anthropological Section of the British Association for
1877. In that address will be found embodied some curious
facts and inferences relative to the classification of groups and
E
2 SCIENCE AND CRIME.
types of men, based on their habits of mind and physiognomy.
Through the application of an ingenious method of observation,
in which, by an arrangement of mirrors, four views of a person's
head can be simultaneously photographed, the full and com-
plete comparison of types of head-conformation can be effected.
As the result of investigations conducted on this basis, Mr.
Galton mentions that by physiognomy, together -with the
general contour of the head, a practical arrangement of criminal
types becomes possible. Provided with a large number of
photographs of criminals, and by familiarising himself with this
collection, certain natural classes of criminals became dis-
cernible ; and thus a scientific study of character may assist in
the determination of the results of criminal tendencies, and,
through these, towards the amelioration of the race.
Thus much for the part science promises to play in deter-
mining the causes of crime and criminals. With the results of
crime, however, science at present concerns herself much more
nearly ; and it is with the ways and means science brings to
bear on the detection of crime that we purpose chiefly to concern
ourselves in the present paper. Our newspapers familiarise us,
day by day, with instances of the application of scientific
methods to criminal investigation. Not a case of forgery in
tried but the expert in caligraphy and engraving is appealed to
in order to aid the cause of justice, by the detection, through
scientific means, of likenesses or differences in handwriting, or
of alterations and erasures in disputed deeds or manuscripts.
Every case of homicide brings its array of medical and surgical
evidence, or its quota of chemists, prepared to do battle for the
truth. Even the identification of a corpus delicti may be a
matter in which medical science alone has absolute sway, and
in which the skill of the medical jurist, with his testimony to
the probable time and circumstances of death, may first point
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 3
the way in which detective science should travel. A bloodstain,
and its nature, when interpreted by the microscopist, may con-
vict the suspected, or may, on the other hand, set him free.
And, in many other ways and diverse fashions, the art of the
detective may be shown to owe more to science than most
people unacquainted with the routine of criminal investigation
could readily imagine.
To select a simple case, and one, nevertheless, regarding
which much popular misconception exists, let us try to discover
the place and power of the microscope in medical jurisprudence.
In such a study we may discover that certain powers, popularly
imagined to be at the beck and call of the microscopist, are
grossly exaggerated; whilst it may also be shown that the
actual extent of the microscopist's ability fully outweighs the
fallacies just alluded to. Chief among the cases in which
the microscope becomes of paramount importance as an agent
in the detection of crime, are those in which blood-stains, or
marks of allied characters, and fragments of clothing' or hairs,
require to be examined and referred to their exact source. An
actual case may be related by way of exemplifying the con-
ditions demanding inquiry. A man was tried in 1857 at one of
our English assizes for the supposed murder of a companion.
The dead man's throat had been cut in such a fashion as to
preclude the idea of suicide. The prisoner had been last seen
in the company of the deceased, and in his possession a knife
stained with blood was found. This knife was alleged by the
prosecution to be that with which the murder was committed,
and the stains thereupon were alleged to be those of human
blood. The defence explained the presence of these stains by
asserting that they were produced by cutting raw beef. Now,
it may be asked, in what position is science placed in such an issue
as the present ? Could the chemist and microscopist, placed in
4 SCIENCE AND CRIME.
the witness-box, swear to the identity of the stain with blood? and
could either testify to its being human blood as distinguished
from that of the ox ? To the first query, an affirmative answer
must be returned. Chemical tests of great delicacy are known
whereby the presence of blood can be infallibly detected. Mr.
Sorby tells us that spectrum analysis will reveal the presence
of blood where the stain is only the tenth of an inch in diameter,
or where a quantity of the red colouring matter of blood, not
exceeding the one hundredth part of a grain, can be obtained.
In so far as blood itself, and its mere presence is concerned,
there are no scientific difficulties in the way of its exact deter-
mination and separation from all other red-coloured stains. But
when we turn to the question of the exact source of the blood-
stains, we find the powers of science to be limited in some degree.
In the case just alluded to, in which the defence rested upon a
statement that the blood-stains were obtained from beef, the
fallacies of that description of evidence which grossly departs from
a scientific standard were exemplified. A chemist gave evidence
in which he alleged that the knife in question had been immersed
in living blood to its hilt, and that the blood was certainly not
that of the ox or sheep. This testimony was offered, despite
the fact, known to every physiologist, that there exists no
appreciable differences between the stain of living blood and of
blood from a recently killed animal ; and that the microscopist
is as yet unable to detect differences between the blood of man
and that of the ox or sheep sufficiently clear to enable him to
decide their exact and specific nature. Even spectrum analysis,
with all its subtlety of method and delicacy of research, cannot
decide upon exact differences between new and old blood-stains ;
nor can it enable the experimenter to say if the blood be human
or that of a lower animal. Fortunately for the cause of justice
in the foregoing case, the crime was brought home to the
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 5
prisoner by evidence other than that of the chemist in question,
and by testimony which depended on no fallacies of microscopic
testimony.
To discover the limitations of science in such a case, we
must make ourselves familiar with the details of an elementary
study in physiology. When a thin film of human blood is
examined under a high power of the microscope, it is seen to
present the appearance of a clear watery fluid the " serum " or
"plasma " of the physiologist in which float an immense number
of small round bodies, the blood corpuscles. These latter are
of two kinds, red and white ; the red being by far the more
numerous, and imparting, through their immense numbers, the
red hue to the blood. The red corpuscles of human blood are
round and biconcave in form, each measuring from the one
three-thousandth to the one four-thousandth of an inch in
diameter. The white corpuscles are a little larger, and attain
a diameter averaging the one two thousand five-hundredth part
of an inch. Thus it may be safely asserted that when the
microscopist is able to discern in any liquid those characteristic
blood-globules, he may positively allege that the liquid in
question is blood. When the further and equally important
question of the kind of blood is submitted to the scientific
observer, his answers must savour of caution. The red
corpuscles of man, unlike the white, do not possess a central
particle or nucleus. They are therefore in physiological lan-
guage said to be " non-nucleated." But it is noteworthy that,
in this latter feature, man's blood-globules agree with those
of all other mammals or quadrupeds. Every quadruped, in
short, possesses red blood-globules which want a central spot
or nucleus. Moreover, all quadrupeds, except the camel tribe,
possess red blood-globules of circular shape ; those of the camel
being elliptical in form. But when we descend in the animal
6 SCIENCE AND CRIME.
scale and pass to the birds, as most nearly approaching quadru-
peds, and from the birds to reptiles and fishes, the blood-globules
are found, in these lower classes, to be not merely oval or
elliptical in shape, but to be invariably nucleated that is,
possessing each a central particle.
With this zoological information at hand, we may be able to
appreciate the power of the microscope as a detector of crime.
In 1851, the defence, in a case of murder tried at the Essex
Assizes, rested partly on the statement that the blood-stains on
the clothes of the prisoner were derived from chicken's blood.
In such a case the microscopic evidence is invaluable ; since the
blood of the bird will contain oval and nucleated globules.
From an examination of these blood-stains the prisoner's state-
ment in the case referred to was proved to be false, the cor-
puscles being those of some mammal. Similarly, when the late
Professor Hughes Bennett, of Edinburgh, was confronted with a
patient supposed to be troubled with chest-disease of serious
typo, an examination of the fluid blood supposed to have come
from the lungs, revealed the presence of oval blood-globules.
The patient's wonder may be better imagined than described,
when her imposture was thus declared plain. Seeing, then, that
the blood of quadrupeds is distinguishable from that of all other
animals, the question yet remains, how far does microscopical
evidence proceed in determining human blood from that of
other mammals ? Here, leaving aside the singular and excep-
tional case of the camels and their neighbours with oval but
non-nucleated globules, the chief, and indeed the only, guide to
the microscopist must be size. This guide, it may be further
noticed, is by no means a certain or exact test; since even in
one and the same animal the blood-globules may vary in dimen-
sions. In some quadrupeds, it is true, the excessively minute
nature of the globules would of itself form a feature distinguish-
SCIENCE AND CRIME, 7
ing them from those of man. Thus the blood-corpuscles of the
musk-deer measure the one twelve thousand three hundred and
twenty-fifth part of an inch in diameter such a size being
infinitesimal when compared with those of man. When, however,
we compare the blood of ordinary domestic animals with human
blood, the difficulties in the way of exact determination increase
in a very marked fashion. It is known as a fact that the
blood-globules of the horse, ox, ass, mouse, cat, pig, and bat are
nearly of the same size ; the dimensions of the blood-globules
bearing no reference to the size of the animal to which they belong.
The blood-globules which approach most nearly to those of
man in size are found in the dog, rabbit and hare. Supposing,
therefore, that in a case of suspected murder a blood-stain were
declared to be that of a dog, he would be a worse than foolish
scientist who would even venture to hazard his reputation by
stating in a witness-box his ability to distinguish the stain as
that of human blood. Cases in illustration of the foregoing facts
are abundantly met with in the records of criminal jurisprudence.
A medical witness, giving evidence some years ago at an English
assizes in a case of suspected homicide, was sharply rebuked by
the presiding judge for the enunciation of speculative niceties
regarding blood ; and in no eyes does such a witness seem more
foolish than in those of scientific men, who know best the
fallible ground on which he is treading. In another case a
scientific witness alleged his ability to distinguish certain stains
as those of horse's blood, and others as those of human blood
such evidence being inadmissible on scientific grounds, arid being
therefore morally and legally wrong.
The power and value of the microscope as an aid to the
discovery of the truth in criminal cases is, however, by no
means limited to the determination of blood-stains. On weapons
alleged to have been used with homicidal intent or effect, the
S SCIENCE AND CRIME.
merest traces of various substances may occasionally be found,
and may serve in the hands of the man of science as important
clues. A Dr. Lyons has left on record a case, in which the
supposition of a person's guilt as a murderer appeared to be
materially strengthened by the discovery, beneath a bed, of a
hatchet to which clotted blood and hairs were adherent. The
hair, submitted to microscopical examination, was discovered
to belong to some animal ; and this fact helped to turn the tide
of evidence in favour of the accused ; although had this case
occurred before the day of the microscope and its use in medicine,
it is not difficult to predict what would have been the result of
the trial in question. Cotton fibres, proved by microscopical
research to be such, served as a link in the chain of evidence
adduced against a prisoner tried for homicide at an Essex. Assizes
in 1852. On the boots of another man charged with a like crime
at Maidstone in 1863, Doctors Taylor and Pavy discovered
some hairs corresponding with those taken from the head of
the deceased, who had been fatally assaulted by kicking ; whilst
some red woollen fibres also found on the boots of the accused
corresponded with those of a woollen comforter with which the
deceased had been provided. So also in a case of much mystery,
in which a young woman was found brutally murdered, a knife
which had been placed in the hand of the deceased presumably
for the purpose of simulating death by suicide bore on its blade
amidst a small blood-clot a number of woollen fibres of a peculiar
hue. These fibres exactly corresponded with those of a woollen
jacket worn by the accused, who was convicted, and duly con-
fessed his crime. Such examples certainly serve to show the
exceeding importance in medical jurisprudence of the veriest
trifles, and to demonstrate ho\v the most insignificant clues
may, when welded into the chain of circumstances, literallv
form " confirmations strong as proofs of holy writ." By aid of
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 9
the microscope, linen fibres may be distinguished from those
of cotton, and both from those of wool ; whilst marked differ-
ences are observable in the hairs of different animals.
Shreds and patches may thus literally piece out evidence
of importance for or against an accused person. And not
less clearly is this fact shown when the trifling details on which
grave discoveries often hinge are illustrated. One Sellis, who
had attacked the Duke of Cumberland, thereafter destroyed him-
self. Sellis committed suicide by cut-throat, and on the left
side of the bed on which he was found a razor was laid. This
otherwise suspicious circumstance, which laid the late Duke of
Cumberland under some suspicion in 1810, was clearly explained
when Sellis was proved to be equally dexterous in the use of
both hands. A man was found dead in 1865 in London under
similar circumstances to Sellis, the left hand having been used
to inflict the fatal injury. The unusual situation of the wound
was explained when the deceased was proved to be a wood-
carver by trade, and to have been accustomed to use both hands
when at work. A singular and shrewd observation of Sir
Astley Cooper's was the means of detecting a criminal of no
ordinary type. A Mr. Blight, of Deptford, was fatally wounded
by a pistol-shot in 1806, and Sir Astley was called in to see the
sufferer. Proceeding to the scene of the assault, Sir Astley,
from an examination of the locality and the position of the
wounded man, together with the situation of the wound, came
to the conclusion that the assassin must have been a left-
handed man. A Mr. Patch answered to the latter description.
He was near the locality at the time of the murder, and,
hitherto unsuspected, he was arrested. On being asked to hold
up his hand to plead to the indictment, Patch at once raised his
left hand. He was tried and convicted for the offence, fully
confessing his guilt before his execution.
10 SCIENCE A^ 7 D CRIME.
The case of Bolam, who was tried at the Newcastle Summer
Assizes in 1839 for the murder of a man named Millie, presents
some features worthy of note as showing the difficulties against
which the medical jurist may have to contend. The circum-
stances of the case were altogether of a peculiar kind. Millie
was killed by direct violence done to the head, and, when
discovered, Bolam was found lying close by in a state of
insensibility, real or pretended, whilst the apartment in which
both were found had been set on fire. Bolam stated that he
had been attacked by some person, and had been knocked down
by a blow on the head. Attempting to escape, he was again
thrown to the ground, and then became aware of an attempt
being made to cut his throat, although by his own showing he
did not use his hands to prevent the injury, and no wounds or
cuts were found upon his hands. The only injury Bolam
appeared to have sustained was a wound on the left side of
the neck, but this wound was neither considerable in extent
nor in depth ; it had involved no deep tissue, and had caused
but little bleeding. His coat and other garments were cut in
many places, but the incisions were entirely unrepresented
upon his body. The case really turned upon the nature of
these injuries, and the solution of their infliction. If they were
likely to have been inflicted by a third person, then this third
party might have also murdered Millie. If Bolam were the
self-inflictor of these wounds, the theory of the prosecution
that they had been caused with the view of screening his own
crime became, on the other hand, highly probable. The
scientific evidence, aided by a full consideration of all the
circumstances of this case, was given decidedly against the
prisoner. The case terminated in a verdict of manslaughter
against Bolam, who was accordingly sentenced for that crime.
Equally interesting, as showing the complex nature of the
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 11
cases which await solution, and of the occasionally simple
fashion in which such solution may dawn upon the investigators,
is an instance related as having occurred at Nottingham in 1872.
In this case a young man preferred a charge of assault and
wounding against a person whose motives for committing such
an offence were undiscoverable. As evidence the prosecutor
submitted his wounded arm, his coat, and his shirt-sleeve. He
showed that they had indeed been cut, but a more careful
examination revealed the interesting fact that the lining of
the coat-sleeve was intact. No clearer proof was required to
show that the charge was false, and the accused person was at
once liberated.
No more interesting details in the annals of criminal
science can be presented than those which bear upon cases in
which the evidence for suicide, as against homicide, has to be
weighed and determined. Allusion has already been made to
cases, such as those of Sellis and the wood-carver, in which
a knowledge of the peculiarities of the deceased served] to
explain the cause of death. An historical instance, illustrating
this phase of our subject, is that of the Prince of Coade, whose
death occurred in 1830. On the 27th of August in that year,
the prince was found dead in his bedroom under somewhat
unusual, and it may be added suspicious, circumstances. The
body was suspended from the window sash by a linen handker-
chief, which was in turn attached to a cravat round the neck of
the deceased. An important feature in this case, and one which
certainly lent an air of mystery thereto, was found in the fact
that the toes of both feet rested on the ground, the heels being
elevated, and the knees bent forward. A chair stood near the
deceased, and the only marks of violence discernible were a few
slight abrasions on the lower limbs; such, indeed, as might
have been produced by contact with the chair. It may be
12 SCIENCE AND CRIME.
added, that the handkerchief was attached to the window at
a height of about six and a half feet above the floor. The
discovery of the manner of death, added to the circumstances
attending the decease, gave rise to uncomfortable suspicion that
the case was one of murder. Living in unsettled times, it was
contended that the prince had been killed by assassins, and
that his body had been placed in the position in which it was
found in order to suggest suicide by hanging as the cause of
death. The abrasions on the limbs, certain peculiarities attend-
ing the mark left by the ligature on the neck, and the fact that
the feet of deceased rested on the floor, were urged as so many
facts supporting the theory of homicide. Certain other circum-
Btances, such as a want of power in one arm, and the fact that
the handkerchiefs were tied in knots of a complicated character,
were duly urged in support of the latter view. But the experi-
ence of medical science gave powerful support to the opposite
conjecture that of suicide. Every medical jurist can point to
cases of suicide by hanging, in which the mere position of the
body at first appears strongly suggestive of its having been
placed in that position with a view of simulating self-destruction.
So far from persons suspending themselves in a free posture in
such an act of suicide, it is comparatively rare to find their
bodies in other positions than those from which it would appear
they could have readily released themselves. Persons have
been found dead almost in a sitting posture, and suspended in
a position which at first sight would seem strongly to invalidate
the theory of suicide. A man has been known to commit
suicide by hanging himself from a hook in the top of a tent
bedstead, being found with his knees well-nigh resting on the
bed ; and one hospital patient was actually discovered resting
on his knees by the side of his bed, having hanged himself
from the top of the bedstead. It is, in fact, exceedingly rare to
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 13
find the suicide imbued with sufficient determination to take
a leap into space; and the explanation of the readiness with
which death may take place under these seemingly unfavourable
circumstances may be held to rest on the fact that suspension
in any position in which the weight of the body is gently
thrown on the neck, induces at first a state of insensibility,
which, as it gradually deepens, causes increased pressure on the
windpipe, and consequent death. In some few cases, the
suspicious elements in the cases before us have been strengthened
by the observation that the limbs of the deceased persons have
been found to be firmly secured. Not merely may the hands
be secured in a case of veritable suicide, but the weight of the
body may actually be intentionally increased (as was found in
a case of suicide occurring in 1844 at Worcester) by the attach-
ment of a couple of flat irons to the wrist ! Thus much for
the curiosities of suicide ; and when it is added that the blind
have been known to destroy their own lives, and that the act
of suicide has been perpetrated by a boy of nine, and by a man
of ninety-seven years of age, as representing opposite extremes,
little is wanting to invest the subject with more than ordinary
interest in the eyes of the psychologist.
Passing somewhat from the domain of actual crime, we may
find an interesting study in the details of cases relating to the
"presumption of death," and to questions of "survivorship."
Both subjects present some of the gravest puzzles of both
science and law. In the quiet course of ordinary existence it
seems hardly possible that even the " presumption " of death
should require to be legally established. But the romance of
life teems with tales stranger even than that of Enoch Arden,
and which show that the possibilities of a person's decease may
require to be duly argued and decided upon by our courts of
law. "The fact of death," says that eminent authority on
I 4 SCIENCE AND CRIME.
medical law, Dr. Alfred S. Taylor, " may be proved by presump-
tive, as well as by direct evidence." Thus the question of
decease may fall to be determined by a jury ; and when the
corpus delicti is not forthcoming, as in all cases of the kind
referred to, " the legal presumption " is in favour of life, and the
burden of proof rests on the plaintiffs case.
As most readers are aware, seven years' unexplained absence
from home and friends constitutes the period at the expiry of
which the presumption of death may legally be inquired into.
With the caution which everywhere marks the footsteps of legal
procedure, an English court once held itself incompetent to
pronounce judgment confirming the presumption of death in a
case in which a woman had left her father's house in 1810, and
had not, for a period of thirty-four years, been seen or accounted
for ; and, according to Best, in his " Presumptions of Law and
Fact," the Court of Queen's Bench held that it could not assume
"judicially" that a person who was alive in the year 1034: was
dead in the year 1827 ! From which statement, the non-legal
mind may reasonably enough regard the "judicial" faculty as
decidedly opposed both to the logical and scientific. In the
suit of Church versus Smith, tried in London in 1853, the
husband of the plaintiff was proved to have been unheard of
for twelve years, and the question for decision was whether she
could sue, as a widow, in her own right. The husband, how-
ever, ultimately appeared in the witness-box ; but the presiding
judge remarked to the jury that in the face of the twelve years'
absence, he should have directed them, but for the sudden
appearance of the missing spouse, to return a verdict for the
plaintiff, on the presumption that her husband was dead.
Missing husbands thus occasionally crop up under awkward
circumstances. Four months after marriage a husband deserted
his wife, and disappeared for seven years ; the woman mean-
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 15
while contracting another marriage in her maiden name. She
was indicted for bigamy and convicted, but her conviction was
quashed on appeal. In another case, an application for probate
was made to the Probate Court in 1858, by the relatives of a
ship-captain who had sailed from Southampton in December,
1856 ; arrived in Calcutta in October, 1858 ; and thence sailed
for Port Louis, but had never reached his destination. Here
the presumption of death was strong enough to cause the Court
to grant probate of the will, although a modern Kobinson
Crusoe or Alexander Selkirk would naturally feel rather
chagrined at the course of events, on a possible return home
after rescue from enforced residence abroad as a castaway.
The subject of " presumption of death" may, in some cases,
join issue with the criminal side of character. A curious and
somewhat mysterious case in point was tried in London. A
man had insured his life against accident for a sum of two
hundred and fifty pounds on the 6th of September, 1856. This
person was single, and was aged twenty-six. A week after
insuring his life, he took a return ticket to Brighton ; leaving
London on Saturday, September 13th, 1856, by an evening
train. The succeeding Sunday and Monday were spent in the
company of his friends. He bathed in the sea on the morning
of Monday (the 15th), and in the evening intended to return to
London, announcing, however, to his friends, when he left at
seven p.m., his intention of again bathing before his departure.
He was traced to the sea-beach, but was not again seen alive.
A suit of clothes was found on the steps of a bathing-machine,
the owner of the garments being missing. The police could
discover no clue to the identity of the owner, save a purse
containing part of a return ticket. Ultimately, the clothes
were identified as those of the intending bather, who was duly
searched for and advertised for, but without success. Forty-five
16 SCIENCE AND CRIME.
days after his disappearance, and on the 30th of October, a dead
body, completely divested of clothing, was found on the beach
at Walton-on-the-Naze, in Essex, situated about one hundred
and sixty miles from Brighton. The evidence of medical men
showed that the body had been in the water from six to seven
weeks. The features were unrecognisable, but a brother of the
missing man maintained that, to the best of his belief, the body
was that of the bather who had disappeared from Brighton on
the 15th of September. The brother accordingly entered an
action against the insurance company, who had refused pay-
ment of the policy on the ground of want of identification ; and
the defence also rested upon the assumption that the assured
person was alive, and that, in short, the report of his death was
merely a ruse to obtain money from the insurance office. The
alleged deceased, it was proved, had been declared bankrupt in
1855, and he had further effected in 1856 insurances in different
offices. His will ordered that the money due under the policies
should be applied to the discharge of his debts. In such a case
the conflicting features of the evidence, and the uncertainty of
identification, resulted in the disagreement of the jury and in
their consequent discharge. Clearer in all its details was the
case of Vibal Douat, a Bordeaux merchant, who insured his life
in Paris for one hundred thousand francs, and was shortly there-
after declared a fraudulent bankrupt. Douat next disappeared
suddenly, and his wife lodged in Paris a certificate of the death
and burial of her husband in England, and claimed the pay-
ment of his policy of insurance. That the case was one of
fraud, however, was clearly proved. Douat had actually
ordered his own coffin, had registered his own death, and had
actually attended his own funeral or rather that of the mass
of lead which was found to be enclosed in the coffin. He wan
arrested, and, in due course, convicted of the fraud.
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 17
The subject of " survivorship," in its obvious and important
relations determining succession to property, presents us with
features no less remarkable than those involved in the preceding
topic. Some dread calamity overwhelms, it may be, an entire
family circle, and it may be left to science to decide from the
circumstances of the case which member probably survived the
others. Such a case came before the Eolls Court in London in
1854. The circumstances of the suit in question are given by
Dr. Taylor as follows. A Mr. Underwood, aged forty-three,
and his wife, aged forty, being about to sail for Australia, and
being each entitled to certain property, made their wills before
their embarkation. By these wills each testator gave to the
other, absolutely, the whole property he and she possessed
respectively. Each will also declared that " if the one to whom
the same was given should die in the lifetime of the donor," the
property should be divided among their three children on the
latter attaining their majority. It must be mentioned that
the family of the testators included three children two sons,
aged fifteen and thirteen respectively, and a daughter, aged
eighteen. In case all of the children died before reaching the
age of twenty-one years, the wills directed that a mutual friend,
a Mr. Wing, should receive the entire property. The parents
and children embarked on board the ill-fated ship Dalhousie,
which sailed from London on October 13th, 1853, and which
foundered off Beachy Head. Only one survivor, a seaman
named Read, escaped; his testimony showing that the ship
foundered on the morning of October 19th, 1853, lay on her
beam-ends for about twenty minutes, and finally disappeared in
the deep. After the ship lay over, the Underwoods, with the
exception of the girl, escaped through the cabin window and
clung to the side of the vessel, but whilst in this position a
heavy sea swept them from their hold, and Read declared that
jS SCIENCE AND CRIME.
they must have perished thereafter. Not a single trace of
them was found. But an important addendum to this in-
formation was contributed by Read, who said that not only
did the daughter appear on the deck after her parents and
brothers had been swept away, but also that he had lashed
her to a spar and cast her adrift as her sole hope of safety. He
stated also that he saw Miss Underwood alive in the sea lashed
to the spar. Mr. Underwood, it may be added, was described
as a tall man of powerful build, and his wife as of small stature
and of delicate constitution.
The suit before the Rolls Court turned on the question
which of the testators husband or wife survived the other ?
The testimony of Read established the fact that the daughter
had unquestionably survived her relatives. The Master of the
Rolls inclined to believe that death was simultaneous in the
case of the parents and brothers, and the result of his decision
was that the property must pass to the next of kin of the
daughter. Mr. Wing, the mutual friend who was entitled to
succeed, had thus no claim, owing to the simultaneous death
of the testators, and judgment was accordingly given for the
plaintiff Underwood as next of kin.
The case was taken on appeal to the Lord Chancellor's
Court, and was finally carried to the House of Lords. Medical
evidence was now sought to substantiate the appellant's case.
All the children having died under the age of twenty-one years,
the case of the daughter's survival was not made a part of the
pleadings. The question submitted for consideration to the
medical experts related to the probabilities of the husband
having survived the wife, it might be even for a very brief
period of time. As the stronger of the two, the appellant
contended Mr. Underwood should bo held to have survived
his wife, in which case Mr. Wing would claim the property of
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 19
deceased under the terms of the will. Even if the latter had
survived her hushand the more unlikely alternative Mr.
Wing would in that case also gain his case. Medical and
physiological evidence went to show that, in face of the facts
that Mr. Underwood was known to be a good swimmer, and
that he was a strong and powerfully-built man, the probability
was that he survived his wife. The difference in age, sex, and
strength, said the experts, rendered it highly improbable that
death by drowning or asphyxia, depending on cessation of the
heart's action amongst other things, would take place exactly
at the same moment, and in this view the more robust subject
would therefore in all probability be the longest liver. Tho
medical testimony was therefore in favour of Wing. Upon
technical grounds the Lord Chancellor, in February, 1855,
affirmed the judgment of the Master of the Eolls, and the
House of Lords confirmed these decisions, one of the judges
dissenting. Dr. Taylor's remarks upon this case are so apt and
interesting that they may bear quotation by way of commentary
on this singular case. This authority remarks: "The dif-
ficulty was created by the legal rule which threw the onus of
proof on the claimant (Wing) under the two wills. The case
of the next of kin, who was not mentioned in the will, was that
the husband and wife died at the same instant of time ; but
this was a physiological impossibility; and had the proof of
this been thrown upon the plaintiff (Underwood) the case must
have failed. The contention of the defendant was that the
testator and testatrix could not have died at the same instant.
This negative proposition could not of course be proved by
direct evidence ; it simply became a medical inference ; but
when the law declares that in the absence of evidence the
property shall go in the same way as if the parties had expired
at the same instant i.e. as if they had died intestate this is
20 SCIENCE AND CRIME.
deciding such questions by a rule which is as arbitrary in its
operation as that of the Code Napoleon. In Underwood versus
Wing," concludes Dr. Taylor, " this rule of law practically
affirmed that an event took place which was physiologically
impossible, and upon that event the wills of husband and wife
were set aside, and the property was handed to one whose namo
was intentionally excluded from the wills of both."
An analogous case, tried in November, 1856, in the Eolls
Court, presents the melancholy interest of having arisen out of
the untoward fate of Sir John Franklin's expedition to the
Polar Seas in 1845. The issue depended upon the determination
of the survivorship of a father (James Couch) or son (Edward
Couch). It was not disputed that the father died at home, in
January, 1850. Edward Couch went as mate of the Erebus in
August, 1845, and it had to be determined whether Edward had
pre-deceased his father, or had survived him. Dr. Rae deposed
that in 1854 some Esquimaux informed him that in April or
May, 1850, a party of white men were seen dragging a boat
across the ice, and that these men killed birds which were
never found in those regions before the month of May. Of
course, no evidence was at hand to show that Edward Couch
was one of these survivors of 1850 ; but the law in this case
declared for the probability of the son's survival ; this course
being adopted with a view to avoid further litigation.
A somewhat notorious case occurred in London, in 1870,
which gave rise to the question of survivorship, complicated
with the additional iuterest of criminal procedure. A person
named Huelin had made a bequest to his housekeeper, with
whom he lived at Brompton. In May, 1870, both were
murdered by a man named Millar, who was tried for the crime.
The body of Huelin was buried by way of concealment ; that
of the woman was packed by the prisoner in a box, which he
SCIENCE AND CRIME. 21
requested a carrier to rope and cord. During the performance
of his task, the carrier noticed that blood was oozing from the
box, and this circumstance excited suspicion and led to the dis-
covery of the crime. In 1871, a suit was raised to decide the
disposal of Huelin's belongings. If the housekeeper were proved
to have survived the master, then the bequest to her would take
effect ; whilst, assuming the opposite view, the heirs of Huelin
would claim the entire property. Here medical evidence
assisted the decision of the Vice-Chancellor's Court, by declaring
that the signs of death were more recent in the case of the
woman than in that of Huelin; and circumstantial evidence
lent its aid towards substantiating that of the experts. The
court decided in favour of the heirs of the unfortunate house-
keeper. A case has also been related in which, during a quarrel
between husband and wife, the latter, in an ungovernable
passion, rushed from the house across a lawn and flung herself
into a pond. Her husband tried to rescue her, but both were
drowned. Evidence failed to elicit any satisfactory details
regarding the priority of death, and the suit which had been
entered into was compromised accordingly.
Little need exists for expatiation on the curious nature of
such studies in ^the shady paths of life, or on the singular
blending of fact and romance in certain phases of human
existence. But one idea may be fairly expressed by way of con-
clusion : namely, that science and law together, whilst often
achieving veritable triumphs in the patient pursuit and dis-
covery of the truth, are yet unable to save humanity from one
of its worst enemies its contorted and debased self.
LOST AND MISSING.
AMOXGST the many curious phases of human existence, none
are invested with a greater degree of interest than those which
relate to the occasional disappearance of society's units, and
which deal with the circumstances attending their absence from
the circle or sphere in which they have lived and moved.
Statisticians tell us that a surprising 'number of individuals
disappear mysteriously each year from the circle of their ac-
quaintance ; and police records similarly inform us of the large
proportion of such cases in which no clue is obtained to the
whereabouts or existence of missing men and women. Indeed,
from all accounts it seems a tolerably easy matter to get lost
beyond recognition or finding; and the annals of detective
science are no better prepared with an answer to the query
about missing persons than ordinary society would be to reply
to the familiar question, " What becomes of the pins?" It will
be understood that we are referring to those cases of inexplicable
disappearance in which no adequate reason can be assigned, in
the first instance at any rate, for the mystery of absence. True,
as we shall presently note, this mystery may be explained in
the plainest but saddest fashion by the discovery of the missing
body ; although, as the sequel will show, the records of medical
jurisprudence teem with examples wherein the identity of the
LOST AND MISSING. 23
lost individual becomes a matter of the gravest doubt and un-
certainty. And thus we note that amongst the unwonted
phases of human life there stand forth prominently those in
which, first, a case of disappearance gives rise to the vain search
or to the discovery of the missing body, and in which, secondly,
science appears to assist in the work of identification this
latter being in many cases a difficult and sometimes a hopeless
labour, impeded, as we shall see, by the grim and even ludicrous
force of circumstances. The well-worn adage that "truth is
stranger than fiction "finds nowhere a better illustration than
in the histories stored up in the note-book of the medical jurist.
And the notice-boards of a police-station may in their own way
furnish the imagination with a more fertile field than has yet
been encompassed by the most facile pen of a Hugo or a Sue.
Allusion has just been made to the difficulty experienced in
the work of identification, even by the most intimate relations
and friends of the missing person. Many examples of this
difficulty may be cited ; the indefinite nature of the task arising
probably as much from the alteration in appearance produced
by the " chilly hand " which sets the features in repose, as from
any other cause. The lapse of a few hours after death may
effect grave change In the cast or pose of the human face, as
every doctor knows ; and police authorities who have to do with
the identification of the dead as well as of the living are accus-
tomed to receive with justifiable care and caution the statements
made by most persons in cases of disputed identity.
A comparatively short time ago an instance of this fact was
afforded in a northern city. The body of a woman of dissolute
habits was found under circumstances which rendered the
theory of her having been murdered an extremely probable
hypothesis. The question naturally arose as to the name and
identity of the victim. Several persons were found ready to
24 LOST AND MISSING.
declare that the body in question was no other than that of
M. N., with whom they had daily associated. Interrogated
closely upon this point, they still adhered to the exact statement
they had made; and their opinion was supported by at least
one fact, namely, that M. N. had not been seen in her usual
haunts for some days prior to the discovery of the body.
Identification in this case seemed to be little short of a certainty,
when it occurred to a shrewd police-officer to make assurance
doubly sure by visiting the city prison, with the view of ascer-
taining whether the person in question might not be incarcerated
within its walls. His search was duly rewarded by the dis-
covery that M. N. was there undergoing a short term of im-
prisonment, ignorant of the circumstances under which, like
some notabilities of our day, she was credited with being " with
the majority " whilst still alive and well. A suggestion gravely
made in connection with this case, that the body was that of a
certain person A. B., was indignantly refuted by A. B. herself
walking into the police-station and confronting her anxious
friends.
But the apparent impossibility of identifying even near
relations may be aptly illustrated by a reference to a case
decided in the Vice-Chancellor's Court so recently as 1866.
This latter was a suit in which the plaintiffs, Holliss, wished to
establish the death of a person named William Turner. Turner
was last seen alive on the 7th of May, 1865, when he was
entertained at Guildford. He then presented an emaciated
appearance; his mind was unsettled and weak; he was un-
shaven and suffering from boils and sores, which were dressed
at the last-named place. On the 17th of May a drowned body
was found in the river Wey, and at the inquest, which was
summoned on the 17th, two men named Etherington swore to
the corpse as that of their father, who was missing at the period
LOST AND MISSING. 25
in question. The friends who had entertained Turner at Guild-
ford, on the other hand, declared their belief that the body was
that of William Turner ; but it was nevertheless duly interred
as that of Philip Etherington. On the neck of the drowned
man a coloured neckerchief was found ; this article assisting in
the ultimate identification of the body, which was effected some
months afterwards, on Philip Etherington, the supposed drowned
subject, walking into his daughter's house. The question who
was the drowned man was then revived. The proofs were
clearly brought out at last. William Turner had left behind
him at Guildford a fragment of a handkerchief; this fragment
being found to correspond exactly with the article removed from
the neck of the drowned body, and the fact that the sores of
William Turner had been dressed at Guildford, recalled to mind
the fact that similar traces of disease were discernible on the
drowned man. To the Vice-Chancellor's mind the chain of
evidence was complete and satisfactory, and judgment was
given establishing the identity of William Turner and the
drowned man. Yet the two sons of Etherington were positive
as to the identity of the body with their father, who in his
turn must have remained utterly ignorant, during his absence
from home, concerning the quandary into which that absence
had led his friends and others.
The medical jurist would inform us that the common notion
that the human body rapidly decomposes in water is contrary
to fact. Especially in winter, and if the body remains below
the surface, are the structures well preserved. Identification
may therefore be tolerably easy, when otherwise free from
embarrassing circumstances, in cases of drowning taking place
in winter, and even after some weeks have elapsed. It may
also, in some cases, be of positive importance, either as an aid
to identification, or for other purposes, to fix accurately the
26 LOST AND MISSING.
date of the death of an individual. Such a case was tried at
the Warwick Assizes in 1805, where a suit was entered by the
relatives of a drowned man to annul a commission of bank-
ruptcy on the ground that, being already drowned when the
commission was issued, it was void in law, and the creditors
would therefore have no power to seize the property of the
deceased. The drowned man was last seen alive on the 3rd of
November ; the commission was taken out a few days after this
date, and on the 12th of December his body was discovered in a
river. Five weeks and four days had therefore elapsed between
his departure from home and the discovery of the body. No
doubt was cast upon the identification in this case, and the
question before the court turned upon the date of death by
drowning. How could the date be fixed ? Nature in this case
afforded a means of at least approximating to the date in ques-
tion. As part of the chemical changes which the human body
undergoes in the course of its decomposition in water or in
damp soil, a peculiar substance called adipocere is formed.
This substance is, in fact, a kind of soap, ascertained to result
from the union of the fatty acids of the body with the ammonia
also derived therefrom ; and when thus converted into adipocere
the body may retain its condition for lengthened periods of
time. The Warwickshire case of the drowned bankrupt ex-
hibited in part the chemical changes resulting in the production
of adipocere, and the natural question, " How long does this
substance take to form ? " came to be raised. Medical evidence
adduced at the trial tended to show that a period of about six
weeks was, at the very least, necessary for the production of
adipocere, whilst a very much longer period was required, as a
rule. This evidence tended naturally to cause the jury to
extend as far as possible, and as far as was consistent with facts,
the time the body had lain in the water ; an opinion which led
LOST AND MISSING. 27
to a verdict for the plaintiff, carrying with it the statement that
deceased must have been dead during the whole period of nearly
six weeks.
.. Perhaps no chapter in the grim romance of life presents
events of more fascinating and mysterious kind than that con-
taining the records of scientific speculation regarding the nature
of human remains, which are occasionally brought to light as
the first, and it may be the only, witnesses of a grave crime.
Here science and the criminal officer go hand-in-hand to ferret
out the dead secrets of crime, often with an ingenuity worthy a
Vidocq, and with the calciilating mind and balancing theories
of a Poe. Nor is the mysterious in crime unrelieved by touches
of humour, and sometimes of even ludicrous perplexity. In
1838 the authorities at the Mansion House were concerned over
the supposed discovery of a human hand in a City dust-bin
the sad relic of humanity proving, after medical examination,
to be merely the fin of a turtle, which had doubtless perished
in a manner well understood in the halls of judicial examination.
The thigh-bone of a horse or ox has, ere now, also formed the
subject of grave inquiry, until the doubts of law and justice
were duly solved by an appeal to the comparative anatomist.
More astounding, because absolutely true, and in the highest
degree perplexing as illustrating the curious and remarkable
coincidences of human life, are cases in which a confusion of
identity, and even of name, may assist in blindfolding justice in
the most singular and bewildering fashion. In December, 1831,
a woman named Elizabeth Ross was tried at the Old Bailey for
the murder of an Irishwoman named Caroline Walsh. After
much solicitation on the part of Eoss and her husband, Walsh
had consented to live with them, and, on the evening of the
19th of August, 1831, the deceased went to the residence of
Eoss in Goodman's Fields, taking with her as her belongings, a
28 LOST AND MISSING.
bed and a basket. The latter contained the taj.es and other
odds and ends which Walsh was accustomed to sell by way of
earning a scanty livelihood. All traces of Caroline Walsh dis-
appeared on the evening of the 19th of August. When Eoss
was interrogated respecting her visitor and lodger, she at first
replied in au unsatisfactory fashion ; but ultimately stated that
Walsh had left her house on the 19th, and that nothing had
been heard of her lodger since. Circumstances, however, came
to the knowledge of the police, which resulted in Ross being
duly arraigned for the murder of Caroline Walsh, and it was
proved by the testimony of Ross's son that his mother had
suffocated Walsh on the evening of the 19th of August, and
had disposed of her body for anatomical purposes.
Now appears, however, a most singular element in the case.
On the evening of the 20th of August an old woman, giving
her name as Caroline Welsh, was found lying in the neighbour-
hood of Goodman's Fields in a state of squalor and filth, and
was duly conveyed to the London Hospital. There it was dis-
covered that she had sustained a fracture of the hip, and after a
few days' residence in the hospital the patient died and was duly
interred. At the trial it was argued on behalf of Eoss that the
Caroline Welsh of the London Hospital was in reality her late
lodger ; and hence it became important to settle the marvellous
identity which had thus arisen between the missing lodger and
the hospital patient. The former, as has been stated, was an
Irishwoman ; but so also was Caroline Welsh. It was found
out, however, that Caroline Walsh came from Kilkenny, whilst
the hospital patient hailed from Waterford.
This first point of difference was speedily followed by the
discovery of other distinctions fatal to the prisoner's case.
Caroline Walsh was described as being about eighty-four years
of age, tall, of a pale complexion, and had gray hair. Caroline
LOST AND MISSING. 29
Welsh, who died in hospital, was about sixty years of age; she
was also tall, but was of dark complexion. Further, Caroline
Walsh was cleanly in person, and exhibited no defect in physical
conformation. Caroline Welsh was dirty and emaciated, and
her feet were so covered with corns and bunions as to present
the appearance of being deformed. In dress, however, the two
women were very much alike ; and more curious still, both
possessed baskets of similar make, that of Welsh having a
cover, which the basket of Walsh wanted.
It may be said that, with the evidence as to the difference
between the women in question, and with positive evidence as
to the death of Walsh, little doubt could have existed as to the
identity of each. But the confused identity of name, dress, and
occupation was effectually set at rest by one remarkable obser-
vation, namely, that Caroline Walsh, the murdered woman, was
known to possess very perfect front teeth; a fact sufficiently
remarkable in a woman of her age to attract the attention even
of unscientific observers. Now, Caroline Welsh was found to
possess no front teeth, and the medical evidence given at tho
trial proved that the sockets of the front teeth had been obliter-
ated in the hospital patient for a very lengthened period. This
latter difference between Caroline Walsh and Caroline Welsh
was too typical to be combated by the ingenuity of counsel or
by the circumstances which favoured the prisoner's defence;
and Elizabeth Ross was found guilty, and duly executed for her
crime. It formed a notable fact of this inquiry, that the body
of Caroline Walsh was never discovered, although the London
dissecting-rooms were duly searched. But the case against Boss
was rendered the more conclusive when the grand-daughters of
Caroline Walsh, on being shown the remains of Welsh, distinctly
alleged that the body was not that of their relative.
The difficulty of exactly identifying the remains of a par-
3 o LOST AND MISSING.
ticular person after mutilation has been added to the crime of
murder, has unfortunately been more than once fully illustrated
by some of the most prominent crimes of recent years. Several
historical instances exist, all unfamiliar to the present genera-
tion, in which the triumph of science over crime has been
signally illustrated. The case of Eugene Aram has formed
subject-matter for poem and story, it is true ; but the exact
details of the crime for which Aram suffered are by no means
perfectly or generally understood. Aram was born at Ramsgill,
Yorkshire, in 1704. Settling at Knaresborough as a school-
master, he became acquainted with Daniel Clark, a shoemaker,
who was possessed of certain valuables, and who was alleged to
have been murdered by Aram and another. Clark disappeared
in February 1745, and Aram was shortly thereafter arrested
on suspicion of having been concerned in his disappearance,
but was acquitted from want of evidence. Eventually, Aram
became usher at Lynn Academy, Norfolk, and whilst there
engaged, his accomplice confessed that certain bones discovered
in a cave near Knaresborough in 1758 were those of Daniel
Clark. Aram was brought to trial at York in 1759. In his
elaborate defence he laid great stress on the difficulties besetting
the identification of human remains after such an interval as
had elapsed since Clark's death. His pleas in defence were
founded on the alleged impossibility of determining the exact
nature, sex, and other particulars regarding a skeleton after the
lapse of many years. The fracture of the temporal bone found
in the skeleton proved nothing ; for was it not probable that the
cave may have been a place of burial in olden times, and that
the injury might have been produced after death in the spoliation
to which graves were frequently subjected? These and like
pleas Aram urged in his defence with singular ability ; but the
confession of his accomplice and the facts of the case overruled
LOST AND MISSING. 31
his pleas, and he was found guilty and executed, having pre-
viously confessed his crime ; whilst with strange philosophy he
wrote a defence of suicide, and endeavoured practically to defeat
justice by carrying his theories into effect.
Two very marked cases in which the lost and missing were the
subjects of legal and scientific examination have occurred within
the memory of every reader of middle age. These cases are the
Parkman tragedy of America and the famous Waterloo Bridge
murder amongst ourselves. Both cases illustrate very typically
not merely the difficulties which beset the question of identifi-
cation, but also the aid which science may afford in deciding the
fate of the lost and missing.
Dr. Parkman, a Boston (U.S.) physician of standing, was
traced, on the 23rd of November, 1849, to the laboratory of a
Professor Webster, a lecturer on chemistry, of that city. There-
after all traces of Dr. Parkman were lost, and the excitement
regarding his fate became intense. It would appear that certain
pecuniary transactions had taken place between the two per-
sons just named, that Webster was considerably in Parkman's
debt, and was, moreover, in embarrassed circumstances. On
Webster's laboratory and its precincts being searched, the
haunch-bones, the right thigh, and the left leg of a human
body were discovered. Associated with these remains were
several laboratory towels bearing Webster's name. In the
refuse and slag of a chemical furnace were found fragments
of bones of the skull and of the spine-bones, along with the
blocks of artificial teeth and a little melted gold. A further
search in the laboratory brought to light a tea-chest in which,
disposed among tan, and covered over with mineral matters,
the trunk of a human body along with the left thigh were
contained. These latter parts and the parts previously dis-
covered were found to belong to one and the same body. Pieced
3 2 LOST AND MISSING.
together, these relics showed that they formed part of a body of
which the head, arms and hands, both feet, and the right leg
from the knee to the ankle were missing, but which at the same
time corresponded with the frame of the missing man in every
particular. Dr. Parkman, at the time of his disappearance, was
sixty years of age. The examination of the skeleton pointed to
its being the remains of a man of about the age referred to.
Parkman's height was 5 ft. 11 in., and the skeleton pieced out
and proportionately measured was found to indicate a height of
5 ft. 10J in. In these points, therefore, the identity of the
remains seemed to be clearly shown. But, as in the case of
Caroline Walsh, there were special points in Dr. Parkman's
case which served to place the identification well-nigh beyond
a doubt. It was quite evident that an attempt to destroy the
head by fire had not only been made, but had well-nigh suc-
ceeded. The evidence of Dr. Keep, the missing man's dentist,
came to the rescue in a very remarkable fashion, after an exami-
nation of the remains of the artificial teeth which had escaped
the action of Webster's furnace. Keep's evidence was, that four
years before the disappearance of Dr. Parkman he fitted artificial
teeth in blocks for that gentleman in both upper and lower jaws.
The dentist could also speak with certainty to seeing these
teeth in Dr. Parkman's mouth about a fortnight before his dis-
appearance, when he had fitted the teeth with a new spring.
The artificial teeth rescued from Webster's furnace were sworn
to by Keep as those he had made for Dr. Parkman from
their fitting the moulds in which the teeth of the latter had
been made, and from peculiarities of make. The left side of the
lower jaw of Dr. Parkman exhibited a certain irregularity, which
was recognised by Keep in the form of the gold plates recovered
from the furnace of Webster. Other circumstances combined to
weave the evidence strongly around the latter as the perpetrator
LOST AND MISSING. 33
of a heinous crime. That the remains had not been used
for anatomical purposes was abundantly proven by medical
evidence ; and that murder had been committed was evident
from an examination of the chest, which revealed a wound on
the left side. Webster was duly convicted by a chain of
circumstantial evidence of the most complete kind, and was
executed. As an eminent authority in matters medico-legal
has remarked on the Parkman tragedy, even the refinements
and appliances of science may fail in the attempt to destroy a
body, or so to mutilate it as to prevent its identification.
Better known from its occurrence in the teeming metropolis
of the world, and from the unsolved mystery which still en-
shrouds the deed, is the Waterloo Bridge murder. A carpet-
bag was discovered on a buttress of Waterloo Bridge, London,
in the beginning of October, 1857. On being examined, this
bag was found to contain portions of a human frame, which had
been so treated as to present a veritable illustration of the dis-
position of Cassim Baba by the robbers in the " Forty Thieves."
In all, some twenty-three portions of the frame were discovered,
these being parts of one and the same body. The portions
missing were the head, the greater part of the spine, the hands,
feet, and left side of the chest ; whilst the internal organs were
also wanting. The questions submitted to the medical inspec-
tors for the guidance of the police in the investigation of the
crime had reference to the sex, age, and height of the deceased ;
the cause of death ; the period which had elapsed between the
occurrence of death and the finding of the remains ; the state
of the body as indicative of its having formed the subject of
anatomical research or not ; and the presence of any peculiarity,
normal or acquired, the discovery of which might lead towards
the identification of the body.
These queries were on the whole answered with an accuracy
34 LOST AND MISSING.
and fulness which bespoke volumes for the patience and skill of
the medical inspectors. The remains were those of a man who,
judging from the full development of the skeleton, must have
attained the age of between thirty and forty years, and must
have measured about five feet nine inches in height. The
person was probably dark haired, judging from the colour of the
hair of the wrists and knee. The cause of death was plainly
apparent. A stab had been inflicted between the third and
fourth ribs on the left side of the chest, and in such a situation
as to have penetrated the heart, whilst the appearance of the
wound led the inspectors to declare that it must have been
inflicted during life, or immediately after death ; the former
alternative being that most consistent with the facts of the
case. The cause of death was, therefore, seen to be perfectly
consistent with the theory of murder, and that of a very deli-
berate type. Equally important for the purposes of the detec-
tive was it to fix the probable date of the commission of the
crime ; but on such a point speculative rather than actual
evidence alone could be offered. It was noticed that, from the
perfect state of preservation of the remains, they must have
undergone some preservative process, probably with the view of
preventing discovery through their decomposition. They must,
in fact, have been boiled and salted, and this latter feature
alone may serve to indicate the cold-blooded and deliberate
nature of the crime. The fact that the remains had thus been
artificially preserved rendered the calculation of the period of
death difficult, and in any case uncertain. But from an ex-
amination of those portions of the remains which were least
affected by the process of preservation, the examiners came to
the conclusion that the person might have been dead for three
or four weeks prior to their examination of the remains ; or, in
other words, that the subject of the Waterloo Bridge murder
LOST AND MISSING. 35
was probably alive in the latter part of September, or even at
the beginning of October, 1857.
Not a particle of evidence was forthcoming to show that the
remains had been used for anatomical purposes. On the con-
trary, the manner in which the parts had been separated, and
the clumsy fashion in which parts which could have been
readily disjointed with the scalpel were separated with the saw,
proved the murderer to have been thoroughly ignorant of the
veriest rudiments of anatomical knowledge. But the practice
of the public in frequently rushing to the conclusion that muti-
lation must of necessity be the work of the medical student, is
founded upon an entire want of appreciation of the labour and
nicety involved in anatomical study ; whilst such a supposition
can only favour the escape of a criminal, by distracting atten-
tion from the true state of matters, and by thus affording him
time and opportunity for escape. In the case of the notorious
Greenacre, who, in 1837, murdered a woman named Brown, in
London, and scattered her remains, clumsily separated, as in
the Waterloo Bridge murder, public opinion at first attributed
the circumstances to the absurd and unfeeling levity of medical
students ; and justice was thus impeded, as it was likewise
hindered for a time in the case of Dr. Parkman, by a similar
supposition. In neither instance could anatomical study have
been made the excuse for the appearance of the remains, and
still less so in the Waterloo Bridge tragedy.
In the latter case no peculiarities of structure existed which
could have been singled out with a view to the identification of
their possessor ; and hence, owing largely to the want of this
particular kind of evidence the kind of testimony which tells
most favourably in the hands of the detective the Waterloo
Bridge tragedy, in all its ghastly details, has tacitly passed into
the limbo reserved for the undiscovered horrors of our own and
36 LOST AND MISSING,
other ages. Not a single direct clue was forthcoming as to this
mysterious crime. The articles of clothing found in the bag
afforded no certain evidence of the nationality of their possessor.
They were torn, and stained with blood ; and a very distinct
stab must have been inflicted through the double collar of an
overcoat, this injury probably being of an equally fatal nature
with the stab already spoken of as having been inflicted in the
chest. The police inquiries appeared to point to the shifting
maritime population of the Thames as the most likely source in
which a clue to the mystery should be sought. A Swedish
sailor was believed to have been the victim ; but there were not
wanting those who thought then, and think even now, that the
crime was of deeper nature than that indicated by the hypo-
thesis of a seaman's quarrel. The care shown in the disposition
of the remains was said to be inconsistent with the unskilled
ways of sailors, and pointed, along with the circumstances of
the death, rather to the revenge of more accomplished assassins.
The fate of Count Fosco in Wilkie Collins's " Woman in White "
is thus believed to have been that of the victim whose remains
came to rest on Waterloo Bridge in 1857. The fact of the
deceased having probably been a foreigner, and possibly being
in hiding in London from his enemies on the latter theory of
the crime having been one of political revenge may account
for the want of success which met the efforts of the police in
tracing his identity. Of the true history of this great crime,
will the world perchance hear something at some future date ; or
will it remain for ever buried in the oblivion of mystery ? Who
can tell ?
The presence of peculiarities of various kinds in the bodies
of persons who are lost or missing is, as has just been remarked,
often of the utmost value in identifying their remains. A case
in point occurred in Scotland, where a skeleton was disinterred
LOST AND MISSING. 37
from a sandy sea beach, an examination of the remains being
duly ordered by the authorities. In the course of the investiga-
tion the medical examiners discovered that the lower portion of
the spine was diseased, and from the nature of the lesion they
were enabled to state that the individual in question must have
walked with a marked peculiarity of gait. This clue, patiently
followed up, showed that the skeleton was that of a carter, who
had been deformed, and who was buried at night in the sand
by his friends to avoid the chances of his body being stolen for
anatomical purposes by the "resurrectionists" of his day. A
similar case is related by Orfila, the celebrated continental
expert, in which a man named Bonino, residing near Mont-
pellier, suddenly disappeared in 1823. In 1826 certain suspi-
cions attaching to the disappearance induced the authorities to
examine the garden of one Dimont, with the result of discover-
ing the bones of a human body. Bonino was well known to
have laboured under a six-fingered deformity in the right hand,
and to have possessed six toes on the left foot. The two smaller
toes of the left foot were missing in the otherwise perfect
skeleton; but on the fifth toe a surface or hollow, to which an
additional toe could have been attached, was plainly discernible.
In the right hand the bones of the sixth finger were absent, but
the palm-bone supporting the little finger exhibited the appear-
ance of having given support to an extra digit. The left hand
and right foot were complete and entire. This evidence, sup-
ported by collateral circumstances, told against Dimont and a
woman, his partner in the crime, and both suffered the extreme
penalty of the law.
The list of cases in which medical science, aided by the
practised and trained common sense of experts, has elucidated
many of the apparently inexplicable problems and mysteries of
crime, might be indefinitely prolonged. But it may be re-
38 LOST AND MISSING.
marked that not merely in the case of the lost and missing
dead does the knowledge of the expert aid the cause of justice.
It may happen that in cases involving the identification of the
living the final appeal is made to the medical jurist and to
scientific knowledge, in deciding upon the changes of structure
or appearance which may accompany and mark the varying
epochs of human life. Cases have been recorded in which the
examination or mere detection of a scar has settled the vexed
question of identity, and has freed an innocent man from the
perils of unmerited punishment. Such an instance occurred at
the Old Bailey in 1834. A man, believed to possess the name
of Stuart, was charged with being a returned convict, and with
having escaped from transportation. Evidence was given that
in 1817 a person of that name was convicted and sentenced.
The governor of the gaol in which the convict Stuart was con-
fined testified to the identity of the prisoner at the bar with the
convict, and no less certain was the guard of the convict-hulk
to which Stuart was consigned that the Old Bailey prisoner was
his former charge. Cross-examined on behalf of the prisoner,
the guard admitted that the convict Stuart in 1817 possessed
a wen on his left hand, and indeed this peculiarity was duly
entered in the convict-records as a distinctive mark of the
person in question. In answer to the charge preferred against
him, the prisoner stated that he was not the convict Stuart,
and that his name was Stipler. Between 1817 and 1834, how-
ever, witnesses who might have testified to the truth of his
statement had disappeared, and were not forthcoming for the
defence. Already the Recorder was prepared to charge the jury,
when a singular, and for the prisoner most fortunate, incident
occurred. A celebrated surgeon of the day, Mr. Carpue, hap-
pened to be seated in court during the trial of the alleged
Stuart. Struck with the evidence of the guard of the convict-
LOST AND MISSING, 39
hulk regarding the presence of a well-marked wen or tumour
on the convict's hand, it occurred to Mr. Carpxie that this fact
could be turned to advantage in the cause of justice. Hurriedly
consulting with the counsel for the defence, Mr. Carpue entered
the witness-box. He testified, as a surgeon, that the removal
of such a wen would entail the presence of an indelible scar as
the result of the operation. If the prisoner were Stuart the
convict, argued the counsel, either the wen or the scar should
be found on his left hand. Both hands of the prisoner were
found to be free from wens and from scars alike, whereupon
the jury at once acquitted him. In this case, a chance accident
and the acuteness of the surgeon may be said to have saved an
innocent man from a lengthened period of incarceration as a
culprit of more than ordinary nature.
The well-known case of Joseph Lesurques, whose misfortune
forms the incident on which more than one melodrama and
novel has been founded, has recently been brought anew under
public notice through Mr. Henry Irving's performance in the
" Lyons Mail," and by his assumption of the dual role of Le-
surques and his villainous double. The case actually occurred
in France in 1794, and its details are sufficiently well known to
obviate the necessity for their repetition here. Charged with
robbery and murder, the innocent Lesurques was recognised,
identified, and sworn to as the real culprit by various disinter-
ested witnesses. Notwithstanding strong exertions which were
made to save his life, and, despite his previous high moral
character and probity of conduct, Lesurques was sentenced to
death, and executed. Soon afterwards, the real culprit, a man
who bore the closest possible likeness to Lesurques, was brought
to justice. It was then seen that the similarity in features,
stature, build, and manner was so clo^e as to have deceived the
witnesses who gave evidence at the trial. On these^ grounds
40 LOST AND MISSING.
alone, and as a matter of common recognition and identification,
the unfortunate resemblance of Lesurques to the real culprit
had unwittingly led them into a " Comedy of Errors," which
resulted in a legal tragedy as its denouement. But more extra-
ordinary to relate still is the incident, well-nigh unparalleled in
the annals of coincidences, that Lesurques was marked "by a
scar on the forehead, and by another on the hand, whilst the
real criminal likewise possessed similar markings. Surely " the
grim irony of Fate " could no further go than this, in causing
chance likeness to assume a form and to entail consequences so
fatal and sad as in the case of Joseph Lesurques.
The Edinburgh Medical Journal for 1854 contains another
equally curious and parallel case of mistaken identity. The
body of an old man was discovered in the river Dee ; the left
ear being wanting, as also was the first finger of the left hand.
Both injuries were clearly noted to have been of long-standing
nature. There appeared to claim the body two young women,
who testified that the body was that of their father ; that he
had suffered from the mutilations found in the drowned man's
person ; and that he had been in the habit of leaving home for
weeks at a time. The body was duly buried as that of their
father ; but on the mourners returning across a ferry from the
funeral, the boatman informed them that the person supposed
to have been just interred, had crossed his ferry half an hour
before. On arriving at home their parent was found alive and
well, but the identity of the buried man, who had possessed
exactly similar mutilations, was never discovered. Another
curious instance of mistaken identity happened in the north of
Scotland, where, in the days of the " resurrectionists," the body
of a man was disinterred for anatomical purposes, but was
seized by the coastguard. The body was duly claimed by a
woman as that of her husband, a weaver, who had been missing
7.0.97' AND MISSING. 41
for some days. Her sons also testified to the body being that
of their parent. The medical student implicated in the affair,
seeing that a charge of murder was impending, confessed that
he had disinterred the body from a certain grave-yard, and on
the locality in question being visited, the correctness of his
story was confirmed by the empty coffin. The body had been
duly buried, and was in turn sworn to by the relatives who
had interred it. Notwithstanding this testimony, the wife and
her sons maintained that it was the corpse of their relative.
Popular excitement was at its height, when the missing weaver
reappeared in his village safe and sound. The case in point
adds another proof to the literally extraordinary difficulty which
seems occasionally to attach to the identification of dead persons,
even by those who may be presumed to have known them
best when living.
To the questions involved ^in the case of persons " Lost or
Missing," there may be added certain curious considerations
respecting the procedure of men and women who voluntarily
seek hiding and refuge from fear of the law, or from other cir-
cumstances in which no fear of legal consequences is appre-
hended. The story is told of a certain wily cardinal, who
wishing to defeat the emissaries who were sent to discover his
secret papers, placed the documents in question in an open enve-
lope on his table, with the result that they were left unheeded
and untouched from their mere position, which seemed utterly
to disarm suspicion. Whether or not acting intentionally on
motives allied to those of the good cardinal, it is perfectly
certain that many of the " lost and missing " members of
society have dwelt for months, or even years, close to the very
neighbourhood from which they had fled. On this principle,
more than one noted criminal has contrived to elude the grasp
of the law by remaining quietly beneath the very nose of its
42 LOST AND MISSING.
officials, whilst the hue and cry sent abroad passed over its
actual object dwelling in safety at home. A case was related
to the writer in which a person of weak intellect escaped from
the house of a medical man, under whose surveillance he had
been placed, and caused much trouble and alarm to his friends
by his mysterious disappearance. The county police who
are popularly believed to stand in the same relation to the
police of cities as do the militia to the regulars were placed
on the alert ; rivers and ponds were dragged, hospitals visited,
and the disappearance advertised, but all to no purpose.
Every trace of him appeared to have been lost ; and his relatives
had well-nigh given up hope of hearing of him again. Judge of
their astonishment when the missing man walked into the
house of his medical attendant about a fortnight afterwards,
dirty, unkempt, and unshaven, and satisfying their query with
the remark, "Oh, I've been hiding in the stable-loft ; " the said
place of temporary residence being a disused loft where he had
lain concealed amidst the straw and hay, and from which he
had made periodical excursions to confiscate or to purchase
provisions with a small store of money with which he had pro-
vided himself.
Beyond the explicable cases of mysterious disappearances,
however, there remains, as we have seen, a large proportion of
instances in which the fate of numerous individuals remains
apparently an impenetrable mystery. Too frequently, it may be
feared, the old apothegm " Murder will out " is merely a dead
letter, after all ; but the course of events, and especially of
criminal life, also teaches us the wholesome truth, that often
in ways unlooked for, through means undreamt of, the Nemesis
of crime stalks its victim down. And in such a work, equally
with the diffusion of sweetness and light in more aesthetic
ways, it may well prove a source of satisfaction that science
is able and willing in no small degree to assist and share.
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
WHAT is the exact nature of the mystic halo which may be
said to surround things medical, when contemplated from the
popular side ? Why should my doctor's caligraphy be (as a rule)
thoroughly undecipherable? and why should his prescription
be couched in a form, which, with its cabalistic signs and writing
in an unknown tongue, savours of the occult ? Why, also, does
my druggist display, on those magnificent jars of coloured water
in his window, signs and symbols arcs, half-moons, and tri-
angles of a nature exactly fitted for the decoration of the skirts
of an Arabic necromancer, and why does he puzzle the uninitiated
with such legends as " Sod : Bicarb : " " Pulv : Tarax : " or other
equally striking devices ? Is there, after all, not a large remnant
of the mystic art in modern medical affairs ? and may we not
also assume that perchance for our mental quietude it is just as
well that the Temple of -35sculapius is an unknown territory
to mankind at large ? It might, for example, prove decidedly
disadvantageous to the conscientious desires and labours of that
worthy practitioner, Dr. Mitral Smith, F.R.C.P., were you able
to construe and resolve the last prescription he left as an aid to
the physical welfare of your better-half, into a mild draught
composed of syrup, a little tincture of orange-peel, and water.
Nor would it tend towards the clear and satisfactory relations
44 IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
which exist between yourself and your purveyor of drugs, Mr.
Taraxacum Squills, were you to discover that the element desig-
nated in Dr. Smith's little documents as " Aqua Fontis " (and
for which Mr. Squills is by pharmaceutical custom entitled to
duly charge you in your bill), is obtained from the water-tap in
that gentleman's back shop, and constitutes a cheap and satis-
factory medium for the exhibition of many important drugs.
To select another case in which ignorance of matters medical is
truly bliss, and wisdom a decidedly injurious acquisition : you
remember those last pills which were prescribed for your worthy
self, when after a long stretch of overwork, you began to think
you had the complete nosology of the College of Physicians
illustrated in your humble frame. You saw the great Sir
Arachnoid Membrane called in consultation write the pre-
scription with the usual incantation flourish at the top thereof,
and you had confidence in the great man's diagnosis, and made
a good recovery from the date of his visit. How great would
have been your disappointment, and how certain your relapse
into those obscure and annoying symptoms over the recital of
which Sir Arachnoid " humm'd " and " ah-d," could you have
known that he prescribed you pills of bread-crumb, to be dexter-
ously coated by y.our chemical friend, Mr. Squills, as a remedy
to raze out the troubles of a worried brain which had been doing
its best to disturb a healthy body. Undoubtedly, then, there is
an ignorance in matters medical which in itself is highest wisdom
for the non-professional mind to follow. To know the little
ways and necessary subterfuges of polite physicians would be to
disturb a whole army of vain cares ; and best of all, there is deep
security for us all in the idea that the legitimate practice of the
healing art includes even a little hale and hearty deception when
the harmless and everyday compound may effect the cure of the
fancied ailment and of the chronic valetudinarian.
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 45
If, however, the straight and honourable course of medical
practice now and then demands a slight amount of mysticism
utterly inseparable from the practice of any scientific art in
uninitiated circles no less true is it that the illegal practice
of the healing art invariably relies upon such mysticism as its
chief prop, and as its sole and most powerful stay and support.
Suppose Doctor Cagliostro, that renowned alchemist whose
degraded descendants you behold at street corners vending
cements for broken glass and tonics for incoherent digestions
had appeared in public, minus the red curtain, the naming
brazier, the ivory-tipped wand, the astrological globe, and the
negro attendant, do you imagine that eminent professor's sale
of the Elixir of Life or the Essential Elixir of Love would have
attained the immense sale which you are aware, from accurate
historical evidence, these famous preparations secured ? Or, if
the doctor, after the fashion of some modern survivors of the
ancient alchemists, had accompanied each bottle of the Elixir
with a neatly printed chemical analysis of the potion, do you
think the preparation would have sold at all ? Decidedly not.
Mystery or nothing, was the practice of the Dr. Dulcamaras of
past decades, as in another fashion it is the saving clause of
modern medicine-mongers and uncertified practitioners of the
healing art, concerning whose nostrums, potions and practices
as related to the public welfare, we purpose to pen a very
few pages.
If the proverb that " familiarity breeds contempt " be true,
I think it may fairly be' maintained that the corollary " Fami-
liarity destroys wonder" is equally worthy of admission into
the category of wise sayings. In the matter of medicine-
manufacture the latter remark holds good. In no age more
clearly than the present has a greater amount of potions, pills,
elixirs and nostrums of all kinds been swallowed by the British
4 6 IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
public. The habit of swallowing by faith, and not according
to knowledge or common sense, is practised in these times to
an extent which few persons amongst us even dream of. Never,
I believe, at any previous period of social history has the British
public so energetically poured compounds of which it knows
little into frames of which it knows less. And this practice of
the wholesale physicking of the nations day by day proceeds
without once exciting our wonder or drawing from us a com-
ment, until we suddenly become aroused to the immensity of
the traffic and to its meaning, when from some side avenue a
warning cry reaches our ears.
The case in point is provable at every turn of the social
wheel. You spend a weary hour at Mugby Junction, but the
tedium of the waiting is relieved by the gorgeous hues of the
advertisements of quack medicines and nostrums, which in every
conceivable shade of colour and design appeal to human sym-
pathy and human need. From patent this and patent that
from Mr. Bracegirdle's " patent elastic brace " for the correction
of stooping habits (illustrated by a gorgeous lithograph of a young
man with sloping shoulders in the act of adjusting the said brace
to his manly form), to a patent "traveller's medicine chest,"
warranted in the compass of a cigar-box to contain remedies for
well-nigh every complaint to which man's flesh is heir, the ad-
vertising tribes claim the attention and catch the eye. There is
Mr. Tlausible's " pills," whose virtues are in the covers of all the
magazines. Close by is Mr. Tartrate's "ameliorating syrup,"
which will supply " tone " to enfeebled human constitutions, and
to anything short of a broken fiddle or worn-out piano. You
may make a note, if so disposed, that Mr. Pepsine's " pistillate
powder," dispensed in bottles at one shilling and a penny half-
penny and two and nine (" larger sizes eleven shillings, specially
recommended "), will effect a cure when Sir Arachnoid Membrane
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 47
has shaken his head, taken a heavy fee, and left you in despair
albeit that you know, in your chemical soul, that the effervescing
" pistillate powder " is but a compound of tartaric acid, citrate
of magnesia, and other allied compounds familiar as " household
words" to the vendors of lemon kali and other exhilarating
summer beverages. It is this " powder " which is advertised all
the world over. You meet Mr. Pepsine's labels on the Pyramids
and in Calcutta ; his advertising contractor is seen at Cairo and
Jerusalem ; he is as well known in New York as in London ;
and you may hear details, if you are curious in the way of
gossip, regarding the palatial residence Mr. P. inhabits, and
of the munificent schemes in the way of charitable education
and otherwise he is prepared to further from the proceeds of his
" powder." Everywhere your eye is met and your brain be-
wildered by the display of advertising sheets and placards ; and
your slumbers in the railway-carriage may be broken and dis-
turbed by a horrid day-dream, in which you imagine that you
have by some mistake mixed the " golden fluid for the hair "
with the " pistillate powder," and that instant dissolution from
the effects of the violent poison is your impending fate.
Nor is your daily newspaper free from the medicine-mongers.
Here, in fact, you may revel in all the details of cures and
cases by your own fireside if so disposed. How much, you
may well ask, may the "Anti-Obesity Company (Limited)"
pay for these three columns which are occupied with single-
line notices (in small " caps ") that the stout-bodied and fatty-
hearted need not despair? Either the company must be drawing
very considerably on its capital thus to advertise by the column
in the daily papers ; or the fat and flabby portion of the com-
munity must be flocking in thousands to the depots where the
corrective to obesity is dispensed. Look through the columns of
your newspaper, and think well over the announcements you see
48 IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
repeated day by day. Then you may perhaps form some adequate
conception of the immense traffic in medicines which takes
place outside the range of the physician's province, and for the
regulation of which, be it observed, there is no legal warrant
further than the stamp-duty which a paternal Government
levies on the " patent medicines " and secret nostrums of the
shops. Truly, a perusal of the daily broadsheet is a convincing
argument of the extent of the trade ; and the ingenuity with
which the public is assailed, and the wares puffed and adver-
tised, is perhaps as remarkable a feature of mercantile enterprise
as any other belonging to the times we live in. But it is in
the country newspapers that you may reach degrees and stages
of medical practice of infinitely shadier kind than the common
appeal to buy a nostrum on the faith of the virtues its pro-
prietor warrants it to possess. Mostly in provincial journals,
you will find the quack pure and simple advertising, not his
nostrum, but himself. Quiet and unsuspecting persons from
rural districts will send post-office orders to London, and will
receive in exchange a few bottles of coloured water, advertised
as a specific the production of which has cost the advertiser
years of patient study and scientific toil for such a charm
does the advertisement and its claims possess in the eyes of the
provincial, whose own parish doctor is certain to be a thorough
counsellor, but who in such a case resembles the unhonoured
prophet at home.
Thus, day by day, the public is appealed to in that most
plausible of interests its health and physical welfare to
spend its money on the potions of the unlearned, and to waste
its substance on the unsatisfying pills and draughts of the
quack. Who has not read, smiled at, and appreciated Wilkie
Collins' sketch of Captain Wragge and his solvent condition
as produced by the sale of a Pill ? Let us quote the sayings
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 49
of the Captain for the sketch is not fanciful, but " an owre
true tale " of the ways and manners of the age. " The founders
of my fortune," says this medical and moral agriculturist, " are
three in number. Their names are Aloes, Scammony, and
Gamboge. In plainer words, I am now living on a Pill. . . .
I invested the whole of my capital, at one fell swoop, in
advertisements and purchased my drugs and my pill-boxes
on credit. The result is now before you. . . . It's no laugh-
ing matter to the public, my dear," continues the Captain.
" They can't get rid of me and my pill they must take us.
There is not a single form of appeal in the whole range of
human advertisement which I am not making to the un-
fortunate public at this moment. Hire the last new novel
there I am, inside the boards of the book. Send for the last
new song the instant you open the leaves I drop out of it.
Take a cab I fly in at the window in red. Buy a box of
tooth-powder at the chemist's I wrap it up for you in blue.
Show yourself at the theatre I flutter down on you in yellow."
Nor is the novelist less happy when he adds to his sketch the
varied styles of advertising with which the successful vei.dor
of the pill pushes his trade. " The mere titles of my advertise-
ments," continues the Captain, " are quite inexhaustible. Let
me quote a few from last week's issue. Practical title 'A
Pill in Time saves Nine.' Familiar title ' Excuse me, how is
your stomach ? ' Patriotic title ' What are the three charac-
teristics of a true-born Englishman ? His Hearth, his Home,
and his Pill.' Title in the form of a nursery dialogue' Mamma,
I am not well.' ' What is the matter with you ? ' 'I want a
little Pill.' " Thus far Wilkie Collins ; and it cannot be said
that our author burlesques the advertising tendencies of the
patent medicine vendors, or the ways and means which these
enterprising persons adopt of introducing their wares at once
50 IN' SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
to the public notice and to the internal economy of the nation
at large.
Treading closely on the footsteps of the patent medicine
vendor, we find the proprietor of chemical wares which arc
destined, so run the announcements, " to add to the armamen-
tarium of the toilet table ; " and which in their nature may he
often harmless, but occasionally deleterious, as every physician
can attest. What is to he said of the innumerable dyes for the
hair and washes for the skin which are advertised broadcast ?
Apart from the moral and esthetic aspect of such "aids to
beauty," there is the medical side, with its testimony to the
evil effects of the lead lotions and other compounds used for
changing the hue of the hair. Nor does the modern practice
of fashionable aesthetics rest thus. Before me lies a ladies'
newspaper, noted for its large circulation, and for the immense
advertising supplement it weekly issues. Here I read of
coiffures innumerable, of "invisible foundations for covering
ladies' thin partings and bald places with hair; " of " artificial
eyebrows" these appendages being styled the beau-ideal of
beauty at twenty-one shillings the pair; of "eyebrow
pencils ; " of rouge vegetal ; of a " creme " for the com-
plexion, " a new discovery for imparting a healthy (sic') white
or pink (sic) tint to the complexion ; " of processes for " effacing
wrinkles," whereby (shade of Eachel) " the skin becomes fresh
and diaphanous " (sic) ; of " an invaluable powder warranted
to whiten the most discoloured teeth ; " of other " cremes " (sent
by post safe from observation) warranted to give a "youthful
complexion " to faces of any age ; of ladies who devote their
time and talents to " getting up the face and eyes in the most
brilliant style " one professor of this art confessing to having
been " a lady's-maid in the highest circles of England, Paris,
and Spain." All these I read with astonishment ; and I begin
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 51
to ask myself whether or not I live in an age when physiology is
taught in schools, and in which Charles Kingsley wrote, and
whether or not such contrivances for ruining health and bur-
lesquing life are used by the fair sex to the extent that our
ladies' newspaper would seem to indicate ? It is certainly a mar-
vellous age in its inventive fulness and profusion of arts where-
with an unkindly nature may he assisted and improved. But
that the morale thus indicated is neither aesthetic, scientific, nor
praiseworthy in any sense, is a conclusion in which I imagine
most sensible persons will concur ; whilst the general prevalence
of the remark, " sent safe from observation," in the advertise-
ments of the vendors of the toilet articles above mentioned,
would seem to indicate that the knowledge of their use is a
matter not for the many, but the initiated and beautified few.
Turning to the physiological and scientific aspects of
medical by-ways, we may possibly find means to arrive at
some conclusion respecting the probable effect of this un-
authorized drugging of people, which common observation
demonstrates to be of such widespread occurrence and practice.
Firstly, let us glance at what, for want of a more suitable
term, may be called the {esthetic aspects of those minor by-ways
into which popular chemical investigators lead those whose
complexions, faces, or figures, may demand amelioration at
the hand of art. That the beautifying or improvement of the
person under certain circumstances is a perfectly legitimate
procedure when judged by the common-place rules of society,
is a conclusion which demands no evidence by way of support.
No one would dream for a moment of disputing the assertion,
to come to personal details, that a defacing wart, mole, or wen
on the face, capable of being readily removed, without danger,
by surgical interference, should be so disposed of. And to
take the very common and exceedingly annoying case, of a pro-
5 2 IN SOU K MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
fusion of hairs attaching themselves prominently, say, to some
simple skin-growth, and capable of being permanently or even
temporarily removed by depilatories, the same remark holds
good. Such acts of personal attention need no excuse. On the
ground of common personal assthetics, apart altogether from the
freedom of annoyance from marked blemishes of face or figure,
the amelioration of such deformities is a bare act of justice
to the individual in question. The removal of a blemish is
physiologically as defensible a proceeding as the replacement
of missing teeth by the aid of the dentist, and in this latter
act we find the truest warrant, since, for digestive purposes,
the possession of teeth or their artificial substitutes is ab-
solutely necessary for the preservation of health. To the
replacement of a maimed limb by an artificial one. there can
be still less objection. The common ground of expediency,
utility, and function, presents us with an unanswerable argu-
ment in favour of the work of aiding nature, in so far as we are
able, by the devices of ingenious art.
Very different, however, is the argument which would fain
carry these same reasons into the domain of the peruke-maker,
and into that of the manufacturer of face-paints and lotions.
On what grounds, {esthetic or otherwise, could a change of
colour in the hair be demanded or defended? Similarly, on
what grounds could we justify the practice of face-enamelling,
or the smoothing out of the wrinkles which time writes
naturally enough on our brows and faces at large ? It cannot
be argued that a false eyebrow or curl is as justifiable as false
teeth, for the purpose of the latter as aids to digestion is plain
enough ; whilst the only conceivable ground for the adoption
of the former appendages would be " an improvement in looks r '
an avowedly small-minded excuse, and one, in any sense, of
doubtful correctness. To the deficiency or want of eyebrows
ziv SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 53
we become accustomed, as to the whiteness of hair or other
peculiarities of physique ; but if the practice of supplying
nature's defects justifiable enough under certain conditions,
as we have seen is to be regarded as legitimate under all
circumstances, the extremes of absurdity to which such a
practice may and does lead are readily enough discerned.
Admitting the false eyebrow, why should we exclude the
" nose machine " advertised for the charitable purpose, when
worn daily (in private), of altering the unbecoming natural style
to that of a becoming and, it is to be presumed, fashionable
olfactory organ ?
Of the deleterious effects of the continued application of the
fashionable lotions and varnishes for the face, medical science is
not slow to testify. Few readers can forget the exposures in
the famous- Rachel case ; or the testimony then and at other
times offered, to show that such " preparations " for the toilet
are made, as a rule, to sell and not to use. Let Dr. Taylor, in
the name of authority, speak concerning the effects of common
hair-dyes. " Cosmetics and hair-dyes," says this author, " con-
taining preparations of lead, commonly called hair-restorers (!)
may also produce dangerous effects. I have met," he con-
tinues, " with an instance in which paralysis of the muscles on
one side of the neck arose from the imprudent use of a hair-dye
containing litharge. These hair-dyes or 'hair-restorers,' are
sometimes solutions of acetate of lead of variable strength in
perfumed and coloured water. In other cases they consist of
hyposulphite of lead, dissolved in an excess of hyposulphite
of soda. In one instance, the continued use of such a dye is
reported to have proved fatal, and lead was found in the liver,
and in one of the kidneys. Mr. Lacy," adds Dr. Taylor, " has
pointed out the injury to health which is likely to follow the
use of white lead as a cosmetic by actors." Doubtless " pre-
54 IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
parations " do exist, in which the metal in question is absent ;
but in any case, the want of certainty as to the composition
of the substance, should, in itself, serve as a condition incul-
cating caution aud suspicion in regard to the use of such
nostrums.
But if the case against mere outward applications to the
skin is thus both strong and well founded, that against the
reckless and undiscerning use of internal medicines and remedies
is founded on still more plausible and efficient data. We are
presented, at the outset of our inquiries in this direction, with
a physiological side and a mental aspect. The physiological
phase of the matter shows us that not merely a special
training, but a technical education of high order is necessary
before an accurate knowledge of the action of drugs in the
human frame can be acquired. Even in this department of
therapeutics, the dark places of inquiry are all too numerous
at the present time. Nothing short of a technical training in
medicine enables the practitioner to diagnose disease; and in
virtue of the same training alone is he entitled to prescribe
remedies to counteract the abnormal conditions. This is the
physiological side of the administration of medicine, including
thus, not merely a knowledge of the kind of medicine to be
prescribed, but that of its effects when given at different periods
of the disease, and at different ages and on varying tempera-
ments of body. To this material side of medicine we must
add, as we have said, a mental phase. The influence of mind
over body is too well known to need remark. The effect of
one man's natural disposition of miud may be to check disease,
whilst another's psychology will predispose to it. Faith in a
remedy may be the saving clause in a patient's life ; a hopeless
frame of mind may involve a fatal termination to an illness.
Hear Dr. Carpenter on the curative power of faith. This writer,
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS, 55
in speaking of expectant attention and its effects hi modifying
physical or bodily action, says, " The effects which are pro-
ducible by this voluntary direction of the consciousness to the
result, are doubtless no less producible by that involuntary
fixation of the attention upon it which is consequent upon the
eager expectation of benefit from some curative method in
which implicit confidence is placed, or, on the other hand, upon
that anticipation of unpleasant results in which some indi-
viduals are led to indulge by the morbid state of their feelings.
It is to such a state that we may fairly attribute most, if not
all the cures which have been worked by what is popularly
termed the 'imagination.' The cures are real facts, however
they may be explained ; and there is scarcely a malady in
which amendment has not been produced, not merely in the
estimation of the patient, but in the more trustworthy opinion
of medical observers, by practices which can have had no other
effect than to direct the attention of the sufferer to the part,
and to keep alive his confident expectation of the cure. The
' charming away ' of warts by spells of the most vulgar kind,
the imposition of royal hands for the cure of the 'evil' (scrofula),
the pawings and strokings of Valentine Greatrakes, the manipu-
lations practised with the metallic tractors, the invocation of
Prince Hohenlohe et hoc genus omne . . . have all worked to
the same end, and have all been alike successful. It is un-
questionable that, in all such cases, the benefit derived is in
direct proportion to the faith of the sufferer in the means
employed ; and thus we see that a couple of bread pills will
produce copious purgation, and a dose of red poppy syrup will
serve as a powerful narcotic (as has happened within the
personal knowledge of the Author), if the patient have been
led to feel a sufficiently confident expectation of the respective
results of these medicaments." Dr. Carpenter adds also the
56 IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
important note "It is commonly said that these effects are
produced by the imagination ; but this only serves to induce
the belief that the sham remedy is one of real efficacy, and it
is the state of ' expectant attention ' which is the immediate
operating agent, and which is necessary to the result. In
whatever mode this can be induced, the effect will be the same.
Thus Dr. Haygarth of Bath (in conjunction with Mr. Eichard
Smith of Bristol), tested the value of the 'metallic tractors'
by substituting two pieces of wood painted in imitation of
them, or even a pair of tenpenny nails disguised with sealing-
wax, or a couple of slate pencils, which they found to possess
all the virtues that were claimed for the real instruments,
because the state of ' expectant attention ' was equally induced
by either."
Such remarks serve to explain the well-known case related,
if I mistake not, of the poet Southey, who, sitting by a friend's
closed plate-glass library window, in the days when the single-
paned windows were first introduced, and seeing no divisions
in the window, concluded that it must be open. On the
strength of this latter supposition, the poet felt cold, went
home and took a severe influenza, which ran through all the
stages incidental to that affection notwithstanding the fact
that the window had been closed during his stay thereat.
Such a case is perfectly explicable on the grounds above stated
by Dr. Carpenter, and in virtue of the " expectant attention "
of the subject.
The phases of faith in the cure of disease may thus be used
to explain very many cases of marvellous cures, effected by
agencies which have been proved to contain no ingredient
possessing the slightest effect upon the diseased condition in
question. With the ultimate good effect thus produced the
remedy itself has nothing whatever to do ; siuce any other, or
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 57
even an inert substance would, if presented to the patient in
the avowed guise of an unfailing specific, have effected the
same end. Moreover, the remedy may be and often is vaunted,
puffed, and advertised under conditions, expectations, and pre-
tensions which are notoriously above its utmost power to
accomplish. Add to these considerations the pregnant fact that
one hears nothing of the failures of such remedies, which
failures must be even more numerous than the vaunted cures,
and we may find warrant enough and to spare for preferring
to take our medicine as we obtain our law from a legally
recognised and duly qualified source.
It is also highly noteworthy that an element of danger to life
may be very frequently represented in the injudicious use of
patent and other medicines a use which habit and custom
together tend to encourage and spread. Next to the extreme
folly of believing the advertiser's guarantee that this or that
nostrum will eradicate from the constitution these serious con-
stitutional diseases such as scrofula, consumption, etc. which
pass from one generation to another with unfailing step, may be
placed the absurd but common practice of using patent or un-
known compounds in doses and at times utterly unsuitable or
even dangerous. It is somewhat interesting, as well as surpris-
ing and important, to find Dr. Taylor, in his classical work on
Medical Jurisprudence, informing us that one form of pill, adver-
tised in well-nigh every language and sold world wide, has proved
fatal, " owing to the large quantity taken in frequently repeated
doses." Dr. Taylor further tells us of a trial which took place
in 1836, wherein a man was convicted of homicide through the
administration in large doses of the pills in question. Speaking
of another and equally celebrated pill, well-nigh a household
word, Dr. Taylor says that the principal ingredient therein is
aloes ! surely a drug of common enough occurrence in the
58 AV SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
officinal pills of the ordinary pharmacopoeia, but utterly wanting
the marvellous virtues ascribed to the pills in question by the
advertising proprietor. The list of nostrums is by no means
exhausted with potions and pills designed to cure any and
every ailment ; for to these may be added the plasters and em-
brocations, for the use of which judging from the advertisements
once more effects little if anything short of miraculous are
claimed. That plasters and like apparatus cannot act through
the medium of the skin to which they are applied, is evident from
the well-known physiological fact that the skin-surface is at the
best but a feeble absorbent of any matters with which it is merely
brought in contact. Hence, the marvellous plasters of the quack
may relieve, probably by affording heat and support to the
affected parts. Certainly, there exist no facts in physiology to
credit the belief in an unknown specific action exerted through
topical applications to the skin. A final consideration concern-
ing advertised nostrums and potions consists in the observation
that certain substances, known to exert a natural function in the
bodily processes, are duly advertised and made the subject of the
usual puff medical. Such a substance is pepsin, the essential
principle of the gastric juice, lauded for the cure of certain
forms of dyspepsia. In the latter instance, there exist un-
questionable grounds for the idea that pepsin may serve as a
digestive stimulant ; but, at the same time, its administration
and the circumstances in which it is serviceable are matters
to be determined by the physician alone. Considering further
that all the ingredients at the command of the unscientific
quack are ready on the druggist's shelves, to be compounded on
the order of intelligent science for the relief of humanity, it
is difficult to see wherein lies the advantage that humanity
commonly supposes it may gain by taking the nostrum or
potion on blind faith alone. Certainly, the advantage is not
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 59
on the side of pecuniary gain or profit to the purchaser ; and
the less said about the purity of quality of the drugs employed
the better, in the absence of any test of such purity save the
advertisements, the claims and tenor of which, in other respects,
are notoriously absurd. The transference of public faith
blind or intelligent in matters medical to the educated prac-
titioner and his work, would serve as a powerful means of
limiting the injurious and unchecked sale of the tons and
hogsheads of drugs which are yearly swallowed, to the good,
it may be, of the few, but unquestionably to the injury of the
many also. There is, in this view of matters, no wiser saw said
perhaps, than that which declares that the man who is his own
doctor or, let us add, the quack he employs has, in either
case, a fool for his patient.
An incursion, however slight, into medical by-ways would
be incomplete without a reference to the practice of bone-
setting a practice concerning which much misconception exists,
not merely in non-professional, but it may be added in
medical circles as well. The bone-setters, as a rule, flourish in
provincial towns and remote districts, and include within their
ranks female practitioners, known in the dialect of Northern
England and of Scotland as " skilly women " i.e., skilful in
their art. Prompted, presumably, by the feeling of confidence
and belief in the occult and mysterious, and in the gifts of healing
which, like Dogberry's writing and reading, " come by nature,"
the uninstructed amongst us seek this description of medical
aid. For the bone-setter usually exhibits not a little of the
mystic in his work. " I don't know how I got my learning of
the bones," said an individual of the race to me on one occasion ;
"I believe it comes unbeknown to yourself. I began to feel
about the bones, and I've got to know mostly what's wrong by
the touch, and I learn how to put one thing right by another."
60 IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
There was shrewdness in the latter part of the man's observa-
tion, namely that the experience of former cases guided him in
present exigencies. Here and there one may meet with a more
than usually intelligent man amongst these rough and ready
practitioners. Such a man will have clear enough ideas of the
number and relations of the chief bones and their joints ; for
it need hardly be remarked, that it is in cases of dislocations,
recent and often old-standing as well, that the bone-setter's art
chiefly comes to the front. But cases of the extreme of
anatomical ignorance are only too frequent among the fraternity
I speak of. I remember one old jWoman, famed for miles
around her district in Scotland as a "skilly" person, who
informed a friend of mine that she had, a short time previously
to his visit, reduced a dislocation " of the two small bones of the
elbow ! " whilst I have repeatedly heard a bone-setter speak of
small bones in the neighbourhood of the hip-joint two situa-
tions in which, it is hardly needful to remark, no " small bones "
exist at all.
Time was when the bone-setter's art was quietly passed over
by the surgeon as simply a matter of chance success and coarse
usage. Of failures he never heard aught, but the cures were
naturally lauded to the skies ; and hence it was not wonderful
that the trained anatomist, knowing well the difficulties of
reducing old dislocations and the dangers attending their treat-
ment, should regard as impossibilities the tricks of the bone-
setter and his kin. In 1871, however, appeared a highly in-
teresting volume, entitled " On Bone-setting (so called) and its
Relation to the Treatment of Joints crippled by Injury, Rheuma-
tism, Inflammation, etc." The author, Dr. Wharton P. Hood, in
a most interesting preface gives the history of his researches
into the art of bone-setting. It appears that the author's father,
Dr. Peter Hood, attended the late Mr. Button, a very famous
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 61
London bone-setter, in a long and severe illness. Dr. Hood
refused to take any fees for his medical services, on the ground
that Mr. Hutton had benefited many poor persons by the exercise
of his art. Touched by Dr. Hood's kindness, Mr. Hutton offered
to show that gentleman the details of his practice as a bone-
setter, and Dr. Wharton Hood, in place of his father, went to
Mr. Button's London residence, carefully investigated his modes
of treatment, and after Mr. Button's death contributed to the
pages of medical science a record of what he had seen and
observed. "During a second illness from which Mr. Hutton
suffered," says Dr. Hood# " I took absolute charge of the poorer
class of patients whom he was accustomed to attend gratuitously,
and found that I could easily accomplish all I had seen him
do." " I found, however," adds the author, " that it (the inter-
course with Mr. Hutton) had lasted long enough to give me
knowledge of a kind that is not conveyed in ordinary surgical
teaching, and that, when guided by anatomy, is of the highest
practical value, as well in preventive as in curative treatment."
The words which I have underlined form a most important
portion of Dr. Hood's statement, and serve to show that, whilst
recognising the merits of the bone-setter's art, he had also lit
upon the true cause of its defects namely, absence of anatomical
knowledge.
The volume in question bears a more than usually interesting
character, from its attempt to explain in detail, and in scientific
fashion, the reasons for the successful practice of an art which
previously had been denounced right and left by high authority
in matters surgical. To its pages, I may refer those readers
whose interest in the subject, and in the opening up of a curious
by-way of medical science, is sufficiently strong. But I may
briefly indicate here the main features of the bone-setter's treat-
ment, and the principles to which his success is due. Dr. Hood
62 IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS.
says that Mr. Hutton " was entirely destitute of anatomical
knowledge, and firmly believed the truth of his ordinary state-
ment (repeated, I may remark, in parenthesis, by nearly all
bone-setters as a kind of dogma) that ' the joint was out.' To
him there was no other possible explanation of a constantly
recurring sequence of events. A joint previously stiff, painful,
and helpless, was almost instantly restored to freedom of action
by his handling, and the change was often attended by an
audible sound, which he regarded as an evidence of the return
of the bone to its place. When this, to him, pleasant noise was
heard, he would look in his patient's face, and say in his broad
dialect, ' Did ye hear that ? ' The reply would be, ' Yes ; ' and
his rejoinder, 'Now ye're all right use your limb.' To the
patient, probably as ignorant of anatomy as Mr. Hutton himself,
who had hobbled to him on crutches, often after prolonged
surgical treatment, and who went away ' walking and leaping,'
it can be no matter for surprise that the explanation was also
fully sufficient." Dr. Hood's pages abundantly prove that his
definition and explanation of the bone-setter's art are correct.
The art is simply that of breaking down, by dexterously applied
force, the adhesions or other impediments which, as the result
of accident or disease, have formed between bones or around
joints. As the Lancet remarked, such a practice is but a
" neglected corner of the domain of surgery," and when through
the empirical labours of the bone-setter it is brought into the
light of every-day and accurate knowledge, a new means of
healing is thus placed in the hands of the educated practitioner.
So that the art of bone-setting abused as it may be in many
ways, and often exhibiting its own disastrous failures is, after
all, but an illustration of the value of research into unwonted
methods of practice, and of the possibility of finding wisdom in
most unlikely places.
IN SOME MEDICAL BY-WAYS. 63
But little need be said by way of pointing the moral of the
present paper, save, indeed, to indicate one very material aid
towards the growth of a rational knowledge of the laws of
health, in the teaching of physiology in our schools. Each year
the Science and Art Department examines its thousands in
physiology ; government inspectors examine hundreds of school-
boys and school-girls each year in this subject ; and in many
ways literary and otherwise the knowledge how to live wisely
and well grows apace amongst us as an educative, elevating, and
refining influence. The best corrective to violations of the laws
of health, to common abuses of foods and drinks, and to the
inroads of the medicine-vendor upon civilization, is assuredly
the instruction of the people, and especially of the young, in the
elements of life-science and hygiene. Already the educationist's
work bears good fruit, but a vast deal yet remains to be done
in the way of correcting popular errors in living, and in teaching
those things which make for physical salvation. One criterion
of the advance of such knowledge we may possess in our daily
newspaper since the appearance of quack nostrums in its
columns will be in inverse proportion to the spread of physio-
logy among the people. We shall not see the nostrums in the
stamped wrappers disappear yet awhile ; but we may at least
live in hope that, ere many years are past, the vendor of mystic
potions will find a decreasing sale for his wares, and will light
upon an evil time to find his occupation gone.
AT JAMBACH'S.
A BLOCK in Leadenhall Street another delay, necessitating
much objurgation on the part of our hansoni-driver, in White-
chapel a narrow shave and escape from a Juggernaut of a
railway van in Leman Street, and at last we are deposited iu
St. George Street East, which is adjacent to the Docks, and
which, at the same time, lies without the London that every-
day people know. I suppose dwellers in the West End rarely,
if ever, venture as far east even as Leman Street. I have heard,
indeed, of a West End dandy who had paid a rash visit to a sea-
faring friend at the Docks, and whose yellow kids and shining
boots interested the denizens of Smithfield so highly that he had
to voluntarily imprison himself in Lemau Street Police Station till
the sergeant on duty called a hansom, and escorted him thereto
for safe transit to Piccadilly. Even city men are hazy as to the
whereabouts of St. George Street East. "Somewhere near the
Docks" is the general direction ; but you may take a day and a
half to find the " somewhere " even after the directions just
given. Hansom cab-drivers, ubiquitous and knowing as to the
mazes of Pimlico, or the labyrinths of Leicester Square, Soho,
Islington, or Highgate, grow cautious when closely pressed as to
their topographical knowledge of the East End. " I'll ask a pal
o' mine as has a wehicle in Leman Street ven I gets there," was
AT J AMR A CITS. 65
the promise of our Jehu when we engaged him to drive us to
St. George Street East there and back for "'alf a dozen
shillin's," as he himself mildly put his tariff. And when we
did get to Leman Street, there was the " wehicle " and its owner
somewhat asthmatic, elderly, and rubicund to boot. The
" wehicle " was a four-wheeled cab, looking veiy much like a
respectable and large-sized tea-chest minus the lead on
wheels, and the " pal " was the driver thereof. " What ! Charley !
not know St. George Street ? Why you're just agin' it/' was
the "pal's" salutation to our Jehu. " Vere do the gentlemen
vish for to go ? " was the next inquiry. " Jamrach's, the wild
beast " I had begun, when the " pal " at once and emphati-
cally blowed the eyes of our driver. " Wot, not know Jammy-
racks ! " said he ; " not know 'im " with a tremendous emphasis
on the " 'i'm." Disgusted with our West End hansom-driver's
ignorance, the proprietor of the " wehicle " pointed down Leman
Street ; a jerk of his finger indicated Dock Street ; and then,
by a mysterious movement of his arm, as if he were an ex-
temporised semaphore, the "pal" showed us that St. George
Street was nigh at hand. " Well, 'ere's yer good health, old
'un," said the hansom to the four-wheeler who looked as though
he resented the inane and metaphorical expression of toast-
making with a public-house very near to his elbow.
A whirl round, a dash down Dock Street, a rapid run along
St. George Street, and we soon find ourselves along " Jamrach's,"
known from China to Peru, from Siberia to the Cape, from Sitka
to Patagonia, as the great buyer of " wild beasts," and purveyor
at large to all the menageries and zoological gardens of the
world. Jamrach's is not a grand place to look at. On the
contrary, it is far from genteel. You have usually to punch
the heads of some half-dozen Whitechapel "gamins" who
throng the pavement and obstruct the doorway, intent on
66 AT JAMRACITS,
having their natural history cheap through the eminently lucid
medium of Jamrach's glass door, before you can see Jamrach
at all. All day long there are seafaring men looking about and
strolling in to see Messrs. Jamrach, father and son, who are
known and honoured for their fair dealing with Jack " all the
wide seas over." Now it is Bill from South America with a
couple of fine pythons; or Jack from India with a fine boa
constrictor, one of which Jamrach junior would have let me
buy to-day for the small sum of three pounds sterling. " It
was playful as a kitten," said he ; but it was also ten feet long,
and had an awkward habit of squeezing one's arm that sug-
gested a crushing of prey unpleasant to dwell upon. Then
sometimes it is " monkeys " which Tom and Harry have had a
hunt after in India, or for which they have bartered a few knives
and beads on the West Coast. Or bigger hauls still may often
find their way to St. George Street. " I'm expecting a full-
grown lion to-morrow, and a tiger the day after," said Mr.
Jamrach to me to-day. " I'll get nearly two hundred for the lion,
and about as much for the tiger," he added, which shows the
capital required to carry on business in the practical zoological
line. An elephant or two is welcomed for a week or fortnight's
lodging it is a nice speculation that of keeping elephantine
bulk up to the mark with complete placidity at Jamrach's.
Whilst, if half a dozen rhinoceroses were landed to-day, and a hip-
popotamus and Mrs. H. and family likewise, to-morrow, Jamrach's
hotel would stow them away in complete security " till called for "
by some enterprising zoological proprietor. When you enter
Jamrach's front shop, you may well deem yourself in the parrot
house at the Zoo. There is such a crackling and chattering of
scansorial birds, imitating very closely to the disinterested mind a
meeting of Home Rulers or Land Agitators, with a sombre old
macaw as the chairman, occasionally calling his audience to order
AT JAMRACH'S. 67
by his gruff, hoarse " caw." There, near the door, are about a
couple of hundred tortoises, to be retailed to the street hawkers,
who will vocally advertise them as " tortises," and as " fine
insecks for the gardin' and the 'ouse ! " In a cage opposite, are
some rare ducks mandarins, and teal, and other species. Mr.
Jamrach junior holds up a cage over which we have just
stumbled, and lo ! there dawns before our eyes visions of the
Eastern Archipelago, suggested by the " fox bats " which climb
on the wires, and show us their queer sharp noses peering out
from between the leathery wings. " Just arrived this morning,"
says the proprietor, pointing in another direction ; and there,
basking by the dozen inside a big box, are lizards from Morocco.
Near the window of the office are chameleons, of which so
enamoured does my zoological henchman, Mr. Perks, become,
that speedily Mr. Jamrach finds a purchaser, and is richer
by a moiety of one pound and poorer by several reptiles.
There are, in all, birds by the hundred at Jamrach's siskins,
grosbecks, cardinals, love-birds, paroquets, and a dozen other
species, which mingle their chirp and their cry in anything but
delightful harmony. A wonderful shop truly, where you may
not demand your articles by the pound, but at so much a head
for this elephant or that bear, so much a pair for these snakes
or those birds, or so much a dozen for the lizards over yonder or
the tortoises just here.
But Jamrach junior is waiting to exhibit his "show-
rooms." You have, as yet, been only in the "shop." The
" menagerie " is a few dozen yards down street, situated within
a quiet-looking entry, trod, I should say, by more queer beasts
than any other thoroughfare in Europe. I wonder how the
dwellers in the front street feel at the near proximity of so
many beasts. What a nice situation for a nervous invalid
indeed ! Imagine being wakened up in the night time by an
68 AT JAMRACHS.
elephantine proboscis giving one a gentle salutation, or by an
invasion of monkeys from the neighbouring cages! Still, I
have never heard of Jamrach's beasts committing any breach
of the peace. It would not pay the proprietor to have his
beasts at large. Jamrach's cages are therefore strong, and
well attended by a quiet-looking guardian, who is the guide of
the bears, the philosopher of the tapirs, the counsellor of
the antelopes, and the friend of the monkeys rolled into one.
The menagerie is not large, but its contents are varied. Jam-
rach's is not a show place. His motto is "quick returns."
I can't say anything as to the " profits," but I willingly believe
they are ample. His aim is to sell quickly ; he dislikes to
have stock long on hand for wild beasts, like civilized and
well-behaved horses, will soon eat their heads off in victuals.
Hence, if you visit Jamrach's, you need not expect to see a
perfect " Zoo." On the contrary, you may think the menagerie
more like a stable than a show. So it is ; but the interest
to the zoologist is great, notwithstanding cramped space and
low roofs, and there is a good deal more to be learned at
Jamrach's and from Jamrach than in many a museum, and
from a long course of reading natural history lore. I say this,
having personally proved the truth of the statements. Jam-
rach's fidus Achales might be an Oxfordshire farm labourer.
As it is, he is a shrewd Londoner, with an intense affection for
the animals whose welfare he cares for here. First and fore-
most, he tells us that he's " thin " at present meaning thereby
not that his personal physique requires addition, but that his
stock is not by any means so varied and large as he could wish.
Yet it seems to iis that Jamrach's is rather full. There are
two fine Eussian bear cubs for instance at the door, which lick
your hand, and are as gentle as kittens. You may have them
cheap at five pounds apiece. On the other side of you are
AT J AMR AC ITS. 69
half-a-dozen different species of antelopes, gentle, timid crea-
tures, with spiral horns, wanting the "snags" and " tynes "
of the deer, with which they are so often confused. Behind,
in the big cage, are two black leopards, growling and snarling
like the fierce Satanic carnivores they are.
Here are vultures, and eagles, and owls, and queer turkeys
close by, and upstairs you will light on other treasures. Up a
flight of wooden steps, and you come to the abode of your
" poor relations." A nice, warm monkey-house it is. In the
top corner as you enter, on your right, is a cage with two nice
Macaque monkeys from India, and another queer, black-visaged,
gentle animal, called " Cetchewayo " by the Achates, because of
a decided resemblance to a Zulu in miniature, and termed a
" Sooty Monkey " by the zoologist from his black hue. " Cetche-
wayo " comes out of his cage, fondles his keeper, growls and purrs
with delight as his woolly fur is stroked, and behaves himself
much more rationally in my opinion than the Zulus at the
Aquarium.* Down below are two wee baboons, or " hama-
dryads," one with a coat (sewed on for economical reasons), and
with a visage and solemnity befitting shall I say it ? a Free
Kirk divine of the narrow kirk type. Up above, are baboons
and rhesus monkeys, all fierce and snappish, and inclined to
deal anything but gently with the visitors who come to see
them. Here the orang-outang whom I saw on Saturday last
in the Westminster Aquarium abode in peace, till he was
removed to near St. Stephen's, and exhibited in all the magni-
ficence of a corpulent frame, suited more to a Tichborne
Claimant than a respectable Catarhine ape. In the corner is
a South American tapir, which rubs against your legs like
* It may interest my readers to know that " Cetchewayo " was
purchased by me and lived as an affectionate family pet in my house-
hold from September 1880, till May 1881, when he died. His
skeleton, however, is held in affectionate remembrance in my museum.
70 AT JAMRACWS.
a mastiff dog when you approach him. A lively mongoose
worries the bars of his cage above, and there are some nice
little Skye terriers and half a dozen lovely Persian cats, black
and white, in the boxes below. Jamrach's elephant sheds and
other appurtenances, as the auctioneers put it, we have no time
to see to-day. Jamrach junior is eager, too, to be off to
business. I rather suspect that burly man I saw enter the
shop, as we came up the street, is a sea-captain, who has per-
chance brought "apes and peacocks" from "Tarshish," or a
gorilla from the Gaboon, or, it may be, a rhinoceros from the
East, or a load of broad-nosed monkeys and anacondas from
Brazil. There are other customers besides waiting Jamrach
junior. That lady is a well-known menagerie proprietrix ; I
should fancy she may give Jamrach commissions which may
send telegrams round the globe. But in the corner I can also
espy Antonio Metalli, of Genoa, Naples, or perhaps Turin, the
organ-man not a bad customer to Jamrach likewise. Antonio's
friend, the Macaque monkey, who climbed up the lamp-posts,
gathered in the coppers, and danced to the " Madame Angot "
quadrilles on the top of the organ, is no more. He has gone
the way of all monkeys, with phthisis, alas! and Antonio,
grieved, and with a hard-won sovereign in his pocket, has
come to select a successor to the late lamented Catarhine.
Hansom once again ; and, with a wave of the hand, Jamrach
junior goes off to business, whilst the farewell screech of
Jamrach's parrots and macaws sounds like a hearty au revoir
as St. George Street East is left far behind.
JELLY-FISHES.
THERE are but few objects of the shore which to the ordinary
observer appear more hopeless of evolving interest or instruction
than the beings which give a title to this paper. So far, indeed,
from exciting any feelings of interest, their appearance generally
inspires the unscientific mind with disgust, if it does not bring
to the surface a stronger and less polite trait of character in the
shape of an expression of repugnance at the aspects of jelly-fish
existence at large. The distrust with which the Medusas arc
regarded has, it must be owned, a firm foundation in fact. As
we shall see hereafter, they possess the means for making them-
selves intensely disagreeable to the human race and to lower
organisms as well, through the possession of certain offensive
organs called " stinging cells." And it is not at all an improb-
able idea that, handicapped thus in public opinion, the more
aesthetic aspects of jelly-fish life and structure have not
received that amount of justice which the unprejudiced scientist,
with an eye for the ethereal, may fairly maintain they possess.
But as in many other departments of human knowledge, so in
the history of jelly-fishes, a one-sided philosophy neither does
justice to the objects it investigates, nor brings profit to its
students and devotees. Although " philosophy " may seem a
high-sounding term to apply to a study of beings which, like
the Scotch minister's sermon (described by an ancient lady-
72 JELLY-FISHES.
member of his congregation), may well-nigh be said to have
" nae vitals," it may nevertheless be shown that a large
modicum of interest is bound up with the story of their life
and existence. It might be fairly enough maintained that, from
a zoological point of view, there are few animal forms which
possess a more curious history that those masses of living jelly
that pulsate through the summer sea, and occasionally strew
the coast for miles, when the fury of contending winds and
waves has wreaked itself upon the hopeless race. The natural
history of these beings has ere now enjoyed the earnest attention
of more than one eminent observer, witness, in proof of this
statement, the researches of Edward Forbes, the charming studies
of Professor and Mrs. Alexander Agassiz, and the recent work of
Mr. G. J. Eomanes. At any rate, in the structure and life-
actions of these organisms, we are certain to find some material
even for wonderment ; and if only as a sea-side study, when the
summer days and smooth waters lure us seawards, the history of
a very " common object of the shore " may perchance awaken
wholesome thought concerning many other and higher objects,
even in the nearer circle of human interests themselves.
Perhaps the biography of the jelly-fishes, or medusidce, as
they are scientifically named, may, as a primary recital, serve
to elucidate certain important matters connected with their
structure and life. Going back some twenty or thirty years in
the history of zoology, we find that those arrangements of
animals we term " classifications " presented a widely different
aspect from those of the more modern lecture-room. Classifica-
tions of any and every kind, really represent the presumed
relationships of the beings we classify. Hence when, of old,
the jelly-fishes were arranged along with the star-fishes, sea-
urchins, and their neighbours, in a large division named the
Badiato, such a classification indicated that, in one respect at
JELLY-FISHES. 73
least that of the circular form of their bodies these animals
exhibited a close likeness. But Cuvier's Radiate animals, and
the Eadiata of later days as well when the lowest forms had
been deleted from that group to constitute a new division of the
animal kingdom soon underwent revision. The sea-anemones,
corals, zoophytes, and jelly-fishes, were in due time separated
from the star-fishes and their neighbours, and were banded
together to form a division known still as that of the Coelenterate
animals. At the present day, when biological revolution reigns
everywhere paramount, the jelly-fishes are still spoken of as
coelenterate animals. They are, in other words, near relations
of the sea-anemones and corals, and possess those plant-like
animals, the zoophytes, as their nearest kith and kin. If,
however, the broad place and position of the jelly-fishes has
been amicably and easily settled in the ordinary run and progress
of zoological history, the changes which have taken place within
the circle of their own family-group have been more numerous
and important. Thus, for instance, we find that a division
termed Acalephce a name given by the Greeks to these beings
in allusion to their nettle-like or stinging powers was con-
stituted to receive all and sundry in the way of jelly-fishes.
There are jelly-fishes and jelly-fishes however. A " Portuguese
man-of-war," the Physalia of the naturalist, met with in the
tropical seas and notorious for its nettle-like properties in the
way of stinging, and the little " Sallee man," or Velella, with its
diagonal sail, also an inhabitant of warm seas, but occasionally
drifted on our southern coasts, would, according to the old and
very general arrangement, be named "jelly-fishes." If the
softness of body proper to these
" Gay creatures of the element
That in the colours of the rainbow live,"
as Milton has it, be regarded as a warrantable feature for
74 JELLY-FISHES.
classing them with the objects of our study, such an arrange-
ment might be permissible enough. But mere softness of body
counts for nothing in scientific arrangement; because, as
common sense itself would urge, such a character indicates
.nothing regarding the structure of the beings we are classifying.
Hence, we find that in due time, the division of the " nettle-
stingers " was disbanded, and its members rearranged. First in
the field with a new and better arrangement was Edward
Forbes, who divided the jelly-fishes proper into the " naked-
eyed medusa," and " hidden-eyed " forms. Forbes likewise cast
out the "Portuguese man-of-war" and allied beings from
amongst the jelly-fishes proper, and thus in a satisfactory
form represented the progress of science in his day. But since
the days of the witty arid learned Edinburgh Professor, the pet
objects of his study have been arranged anew. Fresh facts of
exceeding interest concerning their development came to light
after his time, and brought their influence to bear upon the
arrangement of the jelly-fishes in the animal series. These
newer facts we mean to glance at in our brief study of the
jelly-fish race, but enough has been said in the present case to
answer the first great question asked by the naturalist of every
living being from monad to man " What is it ?" And to this
inquiry, referring to the jelly-fishes, we reply that they are
ccelenterate animals ; near relations of sea-anemones and corals,
and more nearly related still to the zoophytes which, in
the guise of sea-weeds, deck the oyster-shells we obtain in the
dredge, or litter the shore after ground-swells and gales.
There is but little need to describe in anything like minute
detail the general form of a jelly-fish. If we capture a few
specimens by aid of a muslin tow-net, dragged after a boat
in which we lazily paddle over the calm surface of the summer
sea, and convey our booty homewards to a jar of sea-water
JELLY-FISHES. 75
or place them in a convenient rock-pool, we may study their
principal features in ready fashion. A jelly-fish is then seen
to resemble a bell in shape ; and the resemblance to that object
is further increased by the presence of a central organ depend-
ing from the roof of the body and corresponding to the clapper
or tongue. Although, as will be hereafter noted, the term
"jelly-fish" may even now include forms of widely different
kind and of varied nature, the structure here described is
common to all of those forms which belong to the medusoid
kith and kin. So close is the resemblance first alluded to, that
the domelike body of the jelly-fish is spoken of by naturalists
as the " swimming-bell ; " whilst it may be useful to bear in
mind that the clapper of the bell is named the " polypite."
The delicacy of jelly-fish substance is tacitly implied in
the name itself. So unresisting is the bodily fabric of these
beings that they seem to drain away into a shapeless pulp if
we attempt, even carefully and gently, to lift them from
their native waters. And their delicacy of structure is fully
paralleled by the ethereal beauty of their tints, and by the
iridescent hues that play throughout the glassy dome as it
pulsates through the sea, with a regularity of rhythm that
speaks volumes for the stable ordering of its nervous arrange-
ments. Agassiz, amid his severer studies of jelly-fish form,
has not neglected to adorn the tale whilst pointing the moral
of their history. Says this author : " There is a deep scientific
interest connected with the study of medusa?. Notwithstand-
ing their slight consistency and their extraordinaiy transparency,
a highly organised structure has been observed in many of
them; and though the most opposite opinions still prevail
among observers respecting the signification of the facts thus
ascertained, it is not less evident that their structure deserves
to fix the attention of physiologists in the highest degree. It
76 JELLY-FISHES.
is, in reality, one of the most wonderful sights which the
philosophic naturalist can behold, to see animals scarcely more
dense than the water in which they play, and almost as limpid,
perform in that medium movements as varied as those of the
eagle which soars in the air, or of the butterfly dancing from
flower to flower, testifying, by their activity, their sensitiveness
and their volition. Their mode of living, so far as it is known ;
their periodical appearance, like annual or biennial plants ;
their rapid growth ; the short duration of their life ; the bright-
ness or softness of the light which they emit during night, and
which illuminates even the deep ocean ; the wonderful facts
which have been ascertained respecting their mode of repro-
duction : all this is of a character to strike, in the highest degree,
the curiosity even of the most careless." Nor is it wonderful
to find that Crabbe, with his predilections in favour of the
poesy of sea-objects, should have noted in his measured rhyme
the same points of jelly-fish history :
"Awhile to wait upon the firm fair sand,
When all is calm at sea, all still at land ;
And there the ocean's produce to explore,
As floating by, or rolling on the shore
Those living jellies which the flesh inflame,
Fierce as a nettle, and from that its name ;
Some in huge masses, some that you may bring
In the small compass of a lady's ring ;
Figured b}' hand Divine there's not a gem
Wrought by man's art to be compared to them ;
Soft, brilliant, tender, through the wave they glow,
And make the moonbeam brighter where they flow."
Poet and naturalist have alike noted the delicacy of jelly-fish
structure. It is true that their bodies are of exceptionally
delicate structure, but this fact does not appear to have inter-
fered with the practical ideas of a Scottish farmer, who carted
load after load of the medusaj which strewed the sea-coast in
JELLY-FISHES. 77
his neighbourhood, from the shore to his fields, to serve as
manure. The chagrin of the agriculturist over his lost labour
may be imagined when he was informed that he had in reality
been merely watering his fields, instead of adding fertilising
matter thereto. Owen calculates that in a jelly-fish of two
pounds weight, the solids amount to about thirty grains.
Every ton of jelly-fishes would therefore contain about four
pounds of solid matter. The large proportion of water in jelly-
fish structure is not unparalleled, even in the human economy ;
for two-thirds of the body consist of water. Thus, in a body
weighing 165 pounds, there exist 110 pounds of water.
Notwithstanding the delicacy in question, the regular and
active movements of these beings may strike us as of somewhat
peculiar nature. The bell and the clapper are both formed of a
jelly-like tissue which is not contractile, and is of tolerably firm
consistence. When, however, the surface of the clapper, or
" polypite," is examined, and when we investigate the nature of
the tissue that lines the inside of the bell, we at once discover
the seat of the jelly-fish movements. Both clapper and bell
are covered with a thin layer of a tissue, which, without
straining any analogy, may be termed "muscle." No doubt
there is little apparent resemblance between jelly-fish muscle
and human biceps ; but there are to be seen in the former the
incipient stages of the latter ; whilst physiologically both agree,
in that they contract at once and forcibly under appropriate
stimulation. How and why these rudimentary muscle-fibres
act, are matters which do not call for notice here, and which
the interested reader will find fully described in the papers
of Mr. G. J. Eomanes in Nature, and in the Fortnightly
Review (October, 1878). Suffice it to say, at present, that,
like man's muscles, those of the jelly-fish are stimulated by
nerves, which, in the shape of the merest rudiments, appear
78 JELL Y-FISHES.
to present us with the beginnings in the animal world of a
denned sensory and motor apparatus. But when we consider
the regularity of the graceful movements whereby the jelly-fish
swims through the water, we may well be inclined to agree
that such regularity speaks volumes for the accurate and stable
nature of the ruling power seated in its tissues. Thus the
animal pulsates through the water through the action of a
veritable hydraulic engine. As the bell expands, water passes
into its interior; as the bell contracts, this water is expelled
with force from its mouth, and by its reaction on the surround-
ing water drives the jelly-fish forwards. Thus contraction and
expansion proceed with stable regularity. Only when unduly
alarmed does jelly-fish existence seem to bestir itself. If we
touch a jelly-fish whilst, in the full play of its vigour, the
being is pumping its way through the sea, we may note that
we thereby increase the activity of its pulsations, and accelerate
its movements. The bell-shaped disc contracts and expands
under the stimulation of our touch at an increased rate, and
jelly-fish alarm thus carries the organism to lower depths
and to safer regions of sea. As has been well remarked, there is
the most patent correspondence and likeness between the
regular rhythm of the heart and that of the jelly-fish body.
Essentially similar movements of contraction and expansion
operate in both ; unusual stimulation presents us, in both, with
the same increase of play ; and if we further reflect that the
heart, like the jelly-fish body, possesses within its tissues its own
and peculiar nerve-centres, we may perceive a further and most
interesting analogy between the physiology of the medusa and
that of the central organ of our own circulation.
The further structure of the jelly-fish bell or body, however,
awaits our consideration. One distinctive point of jelly-fish
structure consists in the fact that the mouth of the bell is
JELLY-FISHES. 79
partially closed by a membrane named the "veil," through an
opening in the centre of which the water flows in, and is ejected
from the cavity of the bell in the act of swimming. The
clapper of the bell or, as we have already named it, the " poly-
pite "may readily be discovered to form a highly important
part of jelly-fish personality. At the free extremity of this
tongue which hangs from the roof of the bell, we discover the
mouth bounded by prominent " lips." This mouth leads into
the hollow of the polypite ; and the cavity of this structure
albeit that a naturalist would regard it as strictly corresponding
with the inside of the body serves the medusa for a digestive
sac, or stomach. Hither are brought the morsels in the shape
of the marine water-fleas and the allied small fry upon which
jelly-fish existence is maintained, and in the hollow of the
tongue, or polypite, they may be regarded as being assimilated
and converted into the substance of the medusa. From the
base or attached end of the polypite, certain canals are readily
seen to be distributed through the soft jelly-like body. Thus
usually four canals pass away from the base, in diverging
fashion, towards the circumference of the bell; these being
named accordingly the "radial canals." At the margin of the
body, these canals join another vessel which runs completely
round the edge of the jelly-fish body, and which is termed,
appropriately enough, the " marginal canal." The purport and
use of this system of canals are clearly nutritive. Through these
vessels flows the blood which jelly-fish digestion has elaborated
and prepared from jelly-fish food. They represent, along with
the central polypite, the commissariat department of the
organism, whereby nourishment is distributed to the body, and
whereby the losses of tissue and the wear and tear, which beset
jelly-fish activity as inevitably as they follow human action,
are repaired and renewed. Considering the activity of move-
So JELLY-FISHES.
ment in the medusa, such loss of substance must be consider-
able ; and even if existence be of short duration in the jelly-fish
race, it is clearly maintained only at the expense of some con-
siderable amount of energy displayed in the work cf bodily
repair.
The margin of the bell, however, may claim further atten-
tion, as in reality the most important region of the body when
the innervation or nervous regulation of the organism is taken
into account. Here appears to be specially localised those
powers and properties which, diffused through the bell itself,
and propagated to the muscular tissue already noticed as lining
its interior, produce those movements and manifestations of
action that in one form or other are invariable concomitants of
life itself. What, then, are the structures to be perceived at
the boundary or margin of the medusa's body? First in order,
we may perceive the tentacles, or feelers, varying in number
and disposition in different species. Secondly, the " eyes " of the
jelly-fish, in the form of spots of pigment, are readily observed ;
and thirdly, a more careful examination of the rim of the bell
reveals the presence of "ears" as well as "eyes." Each of
these organs constitutes so distinct and typical a portion of
medusa structure, that a few words concerning their nature and
functions are demanded as an aid to the elucidation of the
history of their possessions.
The tentacles are unquestionably organs of touch, but their
functions in the capture of prey appear to be equally, if not
more important. Here are specially localised those means of
offence for which jelly-fish nature, despite the beauty of form
and the ethereal elegance of its frame, has attained a some-
what evil reputation. The " living jellies which the flesh in-
flame " form an important feature in Crabbe's description of the
beauties of the shore; although, indeed, his impartial mention
JELLY-FISHES. Si
of their urticating powers, whilst perfectly true to nature, may be
held to somewhat vitiate the otherwise pleasant picture of medu-
soid loveliness, and illustrate anew the axiom that beauty may
not merely be vain, but deceitful likewise. Stinging powers are
not limited to the jelly-fishes, but are possessed in greater or less
perfection by every member of the great division of the animal
series to which these forms belong. From the Hydra of the
ditches to the corals and anemones of the ocean, stinging powers
form a natural heritage of the race of " coelenterate animals," as
we have named them. The nature of the offensive apparatus is
not difficult to discover. If we take a hydra from its pool, place
it under our microscope, and greatly press its body, we may dis-
cern numberless little threads shooting out from the tissues,
and we may likewise see imbedded within these tissues little
cells, each containing a thread-like filament, similar to those
which have been protruded. The little cells, or capsules, are
" thread-cells," and a thread-cell is simply a minute bag, filled
with fluid, and having coiled up within it a thread-like filament,
which is attached to one extremity of the cell. Under pressure,
or even under the mere stimulus of touch, this cell ruptures,
and thread and fluid are discharged upon the offending body.
The threads are often armed with barbs or hooks, adapted
probably to effect their adherence to the body in question.
There seems no reason to doubt that the thread is simply a
dart, and the fluid a poison in short, we are presented in each
" thread-cell " with a miniature poison-apparatus. Such is the
armature of our sea-anemones and jelly-fishes and their
zoological relations. By aid of these thread-cells, acting upon
tissues of the requisite degree of delicacy, the prey is paralysed
or killed outright. By these thread-cells the larger jelly-fishes
"sting" the incautious bather, and capture the nutritious
objects which come in contact with tentacles or polypite. One
82 JELLY-FISHES.
species of jelly-fish, indeed, seems to have developed special
nervous powers, and through these powers to have inaugurated
special movements for the purpose of seizing and killing prey
by aid of the mouth and central tongue or polypite. Tiaropsis
indicans, for instance, will unerringly move the central mouth
and polypite towards any point in its body which has been
touched. Such an act follows the stimulus of touch as un-
erringly as the needle of a telegraph-instrument obeys and
reflects the touch of the handle. At the mouth in this species
we find a special armature of thread-cells ; hence the necessity
for special sensory powers enabling the animal to localise the
seat of contact with prey. Many of the jelly-fishes are enabled
to sting severely by aid of the thread-cells and their contained
darts. The smaller species do not affect the human organisa-
tion, owing to the inability of the lassoes of the thread-cells
to pierce the epidermis ; but if applied to a more delicate region,
such as the mucous membrane of the lips, the effect of the
thread-cells' virus may then be practically illustrated. The
tentacles of a sea-anemone, which do not affect the hands, will
cause a smarting sensation if applied to the more tender lip.
The Abbe Dicquemare, an enthusiastic observer of the jelly-
fishes and their relations, somewhere remarks that the sting of
certain species of Oceania was felt only when they were brought
in contact with sensitive portions of the body, such as the eyes
an observation which called forth from Edward Forbes the
remark that most sensible people would prefer to keep " their
eyes intact to poking medusas into them." Forbes has left on
record an amusing account of the virulence of Cyancea, one of
the species of jelly-fishes common on our southern shores.
" Once tangled in its trailing * hair,' " says Forbes, " the un-
fortunate who has recklessly ventured across the graceful
monster's path too eoon writhes in prickly torture. Every
JELLY-FISHES. 83
struggle but binds the poisonous threads more firmly round his
body, and then there is no escape ; for when the winder of the
fatal net finds his course impeded by the terrified human
wrestling in its coils, he, seeking no combat with the mightier
biped, casts loose his envenomed arms and swims away. The
amputated weapons, severed from their parent-body, vent
vengeance on the cause of their destruction, and sting as fiercely
as if their original proprietor gave the word of attack." After
this graphic description of the stinging propensities of the jelly-
fishes, the appellation of "medusae" bestowed upon these
forms, in allusion to the snake-locks of the mythological
personage, is seen to be by no means of far-fetched nature.
Jelly-fish existence is thus seen to be accompanied by
powers of offence of no mean order. Those near neighbours of
the medusas, already alluded to the Portuguese men-of-war
possess, of all members of the race, the most powerful thread-
cells. Not merely are the thread-cells in these elegant creatures
of large size, but the body is provided with what have been
named by Carl Vogt fils pecheurs, or " fishing-lines," these latter
organs being long filaments, provided with thread-cells, and
capable of being projected like armed lassoes against any body
floating at a distance. The sting of a " Portuguese man-of-war "
appears to be no light matter, judging from the accounts of
its severity furnished by more than one trustworthy observer.
Symptoms resembling those of severe acute inflammation persist
for days in some cases, and pain may be experienced in the
injured part for a lengthened period after the physalia's attack.
Turning to the remaining organs borne by the margin of
the jelly-fish body, we find eyes and ears to await our survey.
The "eyes" in question are represented by specks of colour,
on the surface of which a little clear refractile body, probably
of the nature of a lens, is found. In the determination of the
84 JELLY-FISHES.
nature of organs of sense in the lower confines of the animal
world, the zoologist is naturally led to associate the beginnings
of the sense of sight with the appearance of pigment-spots.
Even in infusorian animalcules there occur pigment-masses,
often of bright hue, which, for want of any better explanation of
their function or use, we may consider to represent eyes, because
pigment is invariably associated with organs of sight of a well-
developed nature. There would seem to be little doubt, therefore,
that the pigment-specks of the jelly-fish are rudimentary "eyes"
organs of vision these, not capable of discernment in the sense
in which we speak of "seeing" in higher life, but probably highly
sensitive to alternations of light and darkness, and thus serving
to guide their possessors to the surface or to the depths below,
when sweetness and light prevail in the upper world, and when
darkness reigns supreme, respectively. Closely associated with
the "eyes" are the reputed "ears" of the medusa. As the
elementary eye is merely a sensitive pigment-spot, so the
rudimentary ear presents itself to view in the form of a sac,
or bag, containing fluid, suspended amidst which are particles
of lime. Such an apparatus dimly foreshadows ears of a more
perfect type ; but even in jelly-fish existence it is not difficult
to understand how waves of sound falling upon these sacs will
cause disturbance of their contained fluid and its lime-particles,
and how such disturbance, propagated along nerves and affecting
nerve-centres, will produce actions and movements of corre-
sponding kind in the organism at large.
One pregnant fact connected with the sense organs of jelly-
fishes, and testifying to the extreme probability of the body
margin and its belongings being the seat and sources of "sense,"
is found in the discovery that this region of the jelly-fish is that
which reigns paramount in the direction and regulation of the
creature's movements. When Mr. Romanes removed the margin
JELLY-FISHES. 85
of the swimming-bell, "immediate, total, and permanent pa-
ralysis of the entire organ " followed the operation ; or, as that
experimenter remarks, " that is to say, if, with a pair of scissors,
I cut off the whole marginal rim of the bell, carrying the cut
round just above the insertion of the tentacles, the moment the
last atom of the margin was removed, the pulsations of the
bell instantly and for ever ceased." No less remarkable were
the acts of the detached portion. On this head Mr. Eomanes
remarks, "On the other hand, the severed margin continued
its pulsations with vigour and pertinacity, notwithstanding its
severance from the main organism. For hours, and even for
days after its removal, the severed margin would continue its
rhythmical contractions ; so that the contrast between the
death-like quiescence of the mutilated bell, and the active
movements of the thread-like portion which had just been
removed from its margin, was as striking as it is possible to
conceive." Such facts are absolutely conclusive in their affirma-
tion that in the margin of the jelly-fish bell we must locate
the active and controlling centres and parts of its nervous
system. Hence, as an additional conclusion, we may safely
enough maintain that it is but natural to find, in this nervous
area of the animal's body, the organs of sense just described.
The details of jelly-fish structure may be fitly concluded by
a passing reference to the modern position of the jelly-fishes in
the zoological scale, as compared with their previous relation-
ships indicated in the classifications of days gone by. Allusion
has already been made to the divisions which Forbes instituted
in classifying these creatures, and which were named the
"naked-eyed" and " hidden-eyed " medusse, respectively. We
are now in a position to appreciate the meaning of Forbes's
terms and arrangement. The " hidden-eyed " medusa? of
Forbes are now represented by animals which are truly "jelly-
86 JELLY-FISHES.-
fishes," but which exhibit certain important differences from
the common medusae of our coasts. One such difference consists
in the fact that the organs of sense in the "hidden-eyed"
group are covered by a kind of hood ; whereas in the common
jelly-fishes the eyes and ears are not so protected. At the
same time, the differences between the two classes tend to
disappear when we discover the similarity in organisation
which certain species in one division bear to species in the
other ; and, in truth, so far as the popular name "jelly-fishes"
is concerned, the "hidden-eyed" medusas are even more typical
representatives of the term than the " naked-eyed " species.
Leaving zoological taxonomists to dispute the correctness
of their systems and arrangements, we find yet awaiting us, in
our study of the jelly-fishes, phenomena which certainly far
excel in interest even the personal history and individual struc-
ture of the race. The history of any animal or plant is not
fully answered when we have replied to the query " What is
it?" and when its structure has been fully investigated. To
fully answer this question, we must understand its early history.
The query " What is it ? " really includes a knowledge of the
past life of a living being in its reply; and since the adult
stages of existence form only a part of the term of life, it
follows that the "development" of the living being presents
us with subject-matter for study of essential nature to a full
and complete knowledge of the organisms around. These
remarks apply with double force and meaning to jelly-fish
history. It can readily be shown that the exact answer to
the inquiry " What is a jelly-fish ? " can only be supplied by
a study of the medusa in the days of its infancy and youth.
Much of the mystery of jelly-fish nature really springs from
our ignorance of their early history, coupled with the curious
relationships to other diverse organisms disclosed by the recital
JELLY-FISHES. 87
of their development. On all grounds, therefore, that develop-
ment demands notice ; and even its cursory investigation may
be found to reveal much that is startling, not merely in jelly-
fish affairs, but in the philosophy which regulates living nature
at large.
Reference has been made to the fact that the " zoophytes "
are near relations of the medusae. Now, the name " zoophyte "
happens to be a very generalised term for a plant-like animal ;
and as employed here, it is certainly not misapplied, seeing
that the zoophytes which claim the jelly-fishes as near kith
and kin, are so plant-like that, when picked up on the beach
by ingenuous collectors of seaweeds, their plant nature seems
unquestionable. Growing on oyster-shells, such zoophytes as
the " sea-firs " or Sertularians are seen to mimic in perfection the
forms of miniature fir-trees ; and a visit to any museum of note,
will fully convince the observer who glances into the zoophyte-
case, that the animal form may mimic in exactitude not merely
the appearance, but the fixation and manner of growth of the
plant. We have little concern at present with the structure of
the zoophytes, beyond indicating that each of these plant-like
beings is in reality a colony of little animals. Each member of
this colony is connected through the hollow stem and branches
on which the individuals are borne with every other citizen
of this plant-like republic. Through the hollow stem and
branches flows a continual stream of nutriment, which is con-
tinually being elaborated by the mouths and digestive sacs of
the members of the colony. So that as each member draws its
own nourishment from the stream it has helped to manufacture,
the principle of perfect and harmonious co-operation seems to
be realised in zoophyte existence with a unanimity and peace
from the bliss of which the most perfectly organised of human
societies appear to be, as yet, far removed. Zoophyte life thus
88 JELL Y-FISHES.
speeds its commonplace round. The individuals which die and
fall off like the ripe blossoms of the plant, are replaced, as losses
of plant existence are repaired, by new buds which grow into
new individuals. But the parallel between a zoophyte colony
and a plant, ends not thus. The latter will, in due time, make
provision for the future of its race by the production of seeds
seeing that the budding of one individual affects not the increase
of the species at large. Each seed is capable of giving origin to
a new plant, and of thus perpetuating the race in time. In the
zoophyte, similarly, there exists provision for the maintenance
of the species, and for repairing the loss which death inflicts
thereupon just as the local and partial death in the individual
is arrested and opposed by the development of new buds.
At this stage of our inquiries, the interests of the zoophytes
would seem in a marvellous fashion to join issue with those of
the jelly-fishes. In the ordinary course of zoophyte existence,
the little eggs which have been produced by the zoophyte colony
at, first swim freely through the sea. Ultimately each egg
settles down to develop, first one little individual of the colony,
by way of a founder of the community ; and then, by budding,
produces a whole connected series of beings. That is to say,
from a zoophyte's egg, a zoophyte, as the ordinary course of
nature directs, is seen to spring. But zoophyte development is
more frequently extraordinary than commonplace in its methods.
From very many zoophytes, " buds " of a shape not in the
least resembling the ordinary members of the colony are pro-
duced in large numbers. As these buds develop, they assume
the exact likeness of jelly-fishes, or medusae. Sooner or later,
these jelly-fish buds are seen to detach themselves from the
zoophyte-stock which produced them, and not merely to swim
freely in the sea, after the fashion of medusae pulsating through
the water with rhythmical stroke but to exhibit the central
JELLY-FISHES. 89
mouth, the radiating canals, and the sense organs, which, as we
have noted, are the natural belongings of jelly-fish existence.
So that, in short, from a fixed and rooted zoophyte-stock, a free-
swimming medusa is thus produced.
But the history of the zoophyte's jelly-fish progeny includes a
further stage of development, since the cycle of its life is not
completed with its detachment from the plant-like parent. For
a lengthened period, in some cases, this jelly-fish progeny will
swim in the sea, indistinguishable, save through the knowledge
of its origin, from the ordinary or true medusa;. Sooner or later,
however, the jelly-fish bud of the zoophyte will produce " eggs ; "
and when this work has been completed, the clear glassy dome
will decay and become dissolved amidst the waters to which in
the delicacy of its structure it was so near akin. But the " eggs "
will undergo the regular development proper to their race. They
will at first swim freely in the sea. Next they will settle down,
attach themselves, and develop each a little stalked organism,
in which we can have no difficulty in recognising the first be-
ginnings and lineaments of the zoophyte. This first seedling of
the zoophyte-tree will then exhibit the process of budding ; the
primary bud produces a second ; these buds in turn develop
others, which, remaining to form a single and connected organ-
ism, in due time reproduce before us the zoophyte-stock. From
this stock, when the proper period arrives, the jelly-fish buds
will once again be produced ; and thus the circle of development
and the perpetuation of the race will be illustrated anew.
In the consideration of these marvellous relationships
betwixt zoophyte and jelly-fish, it is not wonderful to find that
the older naturalists should have applied the name " alternation
of generations" to the included phenomena. One generation
(of zoophytes) was seen to reproduce another generation of
animals (the jelly-fishes) ; and this latter in turn reproduced the
90 JELLY-FISHES,
zoophyte -stock ; generation alternating with generation in a
curious and apparently inexplicable relationship. Nor was the
problem of such relationship rendered anywise clearer by the
discovery that in certain cases jelly-fishes produced jelly-fishes
without any apparent zoophyte stage or interpolation of plant-
like forms whatever. Forbes remarks such an anomaly, and
Sars of Christiania, at the same period, confirmed the observation
of his English neighbour. Chamisso, the versatile and talented
author of " Peter Schlemil," making similar observations re-
garding certain curious species of sea-squirts, summed up the
alternations by saying that the offspring never resembled the
parent, but reproduced the likeness of the grandparent. And
applying such a remark to the case in point, the likeness of the
zoophyte-parent might be held to be reproduced in the grand-
children; the children of the zoophyte being, of course,
represented by the dissimilar medusae.
As zoological science advanced, however, the true nature of
this so-called "alternations of generations" became apparent.
This latter term was applied to the development we have been
studying, because two distinct animals zoophyte and jelly-fish
were found to apparently reproduce each other. A better ac-
quaintance with zoophyte history reveals the interesting fact,
that between the ordinary buds of these forms buds which never
leave the zoophyte branch and which give origin to eggs that
develop directly into zoophytes and the jelly-fish buds, there is
a gradual and well-marked series of transitions. Further, it is
noted that the jelly-fish bud corresponds in its type of structure
with the ordinary fixed bud of the zoophyte. And best of all,
the study of the comparative physiology of buds and zoophyte
brings clearly to view the important fact, that the jelly-fish is
not a distinct animal in any sense, but merely a detached part
of the colony, specially developed and organised for a free
JELLY-FISHES, 91
life, during which it is intended to mature the "eggs" or
elements which otherwise would have been developed in a
fixed part of the zoophyte-stem. The roving jelly-fish is
physiologically a part [of the mother colony, even although
separated hy leagues of sea from its parent stock. It is simply
an emigrant member of that colony, connected by every tie of
blood, and still more by the results of its life history, with the
rooted colony of the coast or sea-depths. Hence the appli-
cability of the term "alternations of generations" was first
questioned and then denied. It no longer finds a place in the
phraseology of philosophic natural history, when the true
relation of the jelly-fish bud to the zoophyte-stock is com-
prehended and made plain.
But the question may be asked, How does this discovery that
zoophyte-buds mimic the jelly-fishes affect, firstly, our recogni-
tion of a true jelly-fish when we see it, and secondly, the origin
of the connection between jelly-fishes and zoophytes or in
other words the causes which have evolved jelly-fishes and
zoophytes respectively? To reply to such important queries
requires a little further acquaintance with the jelly-fish race.
It may, however, be remarked, that it was formerly, and still
is, a highly difficult question, apart from a knowledge of their
exact origin, to say whether a given jelly-fish was a true
medusa, possessing a personality and existence entirely in-
dependent of the zoophyte-stock, or merely the detached repro-
ductive bud of some zoophyte colony. The ranks of the true
medusa have been sadly thinned of late years through the dis-
coveries that many of the so-called " jelly-fishes " were the off-
spring of the zoophytes, and that their proper place in zoology
was amongst their plant-like parentage. Indeed, being merely
" buds," and not individual animals in any sense, they had as
animals no classification at all any more than a leaf or a flower
92 JELLY-FISHES.
possesses a classification apart from the plant of which it forms
part. It may be asserted that by far the greater proportion of
jelly-fishes especially the smaller species that exist by the
hundred or thousand in the summer seas found around our
coasts, are the free " buds ". of zoophytes, and that only a small
remnant of the Medusidce of past zoology represents a true and
distinct class of animals. Thus, at present, we limit the term
"jelly-fish," popularly applied and scientifically used, to those
organisms which consist of a single mouth or polypite (to quote
the zoological definition) suspended from the roof of a single
swimming-bell, and whose eggs develop directly into forms
resembling themselves. It must be confessed that the jelly-
fishes thus defined form a very limited class. Still such beings
do exist, and remain as the representative "jelly-fishes" of
modern zoology.
Such a typical and zoologically familiar form as Pelagia, for
instance, fully accords with the definition just given. A new
phase of the difficulty, however, arises when the history of
certain other members of the jelly-fish group is made known.
Amongst the " hidden-eyed " medusae (or Lucernaridans, as we
now name them) there are many jelly-fishes which appear in
the most aggravating fashion to turn the tables upon their
zoophytic relations. Here in the course of true jelly-fish
development the likeness of the zoophyte may be temporarily
assumed; just as, in zoophyte development, the form of the
jelly-fish is for a time developed.
One of the most notable cases of this curious development
amongst the jelly-fishes is illustrated by the history of one
of the commonest members of the race the Aurelia aurita,
whose title to be called the " common jelly-fish " can hardly be
disputed. From the egg of this organism, at first, is developed
a little oval free-swimming speck, named the planula. At-
JELLY-FISHES. 93
taching itself to some fixed object, the planula assumes a
pear-shaped form ; and as a depression at its free end deepens
to form a mouth, little tentacles bud out around the opening.
In such a guise exactly resembling the hydra of our fresh-
water pools, or the primitive bud of a zoophyte does the
progeny of the Aurelian jelly-fish appear ; and when the ten-
tacles have become numerous, it receives the name of Hydra
liiba a term applied, under the belief that it was a distinct
form of animal life, by Sir J. G. Dalzell, the once-famoua
authority on zoophyte life and structure. In length the hydra-
tuba organism measures about half an inch, and it has been
known to continue in this stage of development for years. It
moreover possesses a power of producing other Hydrce tiibce by
a process of budding, and thus comes to imitate perfectly the
conditions of zoophyte existence. Its further history begins
when the body elongates, and when it becomes marked across
by grooves or indentations, which gradually deepen, whilst their
edges become notched. In this stage, Sars named the organism
scyphistoma, believing it to be a new and mature animal. As
the Hydra tuba becomes further divided crosswise, it assumes
the appearance aptly described as that of a pile of saucers with
notched edges, placed one within the other, their hollows being
turned upwards. Now it is known as the strobila. Sooner
or later this pile of saucer-like bodies each called an ephyra
falls to pieces. The saucers each swim freely in the water ;
they assume a more concave form ; and soon appear before the
observer as veritable jelly-fishes, or Aurelice, which pulsate
through the sea, and which exhibit all the characters of their
species and race. Not the least surprising fact in connection
with this curious life-history, is that which informs us of the
extreme disparity between the size of the hydra-tuba and of
the beings to which it thus gives origin. A hydra-tuba,
94 JELLY-FISHES.
measuring about half an inch long, breaks up into saucer-like
ephyrce, or jelly-fishes, each of which latter, when fully de-
veloped, may measure seven feet in diameter, and may possess
tentacles fifty feet long. Huge oceanic jelly-fishes, occurring
in tropic seas, and measuring from six to eight feet across, may
thus spring from a fixed organism whose diminutive size would
seem to preclude the possibility of its containing, potentially,
the energies requisite for the development of even an ordinary-
sized jelly-fish. Such facts are not tmparalleled in higher
histories. The germ of the huge sperm whale is a mere micro-
scopic speck in its earlier phases ; and the red kangaroo, which
in its full growth attains a height of seven feet and a half,
measures at birth about an inch in length.
Summing up this brief recital of the history of jelly-fishes,
the question now awaits us as to the deliverance which modern
natural history may make respecting the origin of the jelly-
fishes themselves, and of their relations with the fixed and
rooted zoophyte-stocks. The explanation which modern zoology
is prepared to make respecting these matters is founded neces-
sarily upon the perfectly rational dictum, that the history of
an animaTs development furnishes us with the means for
tracing its origin and descent. Regarding the varied universe
of life as having been evolved from originally simple forms-
just as to-day we see from the shapeless and uniform germ or
seed, the complex and intricate animal or plant arise we should
find small difficulty in discovering, in the history of the jelly-
fishes, a clue to the origin of their race, and possibly to that
of the zoophyte-stock likewise. If one stage in the common
development of zoophytes and jelly-fishes may be credited with
representing, more typically than other, the elementary form
of the race, one might reasonably lean towards the hydra-tuba
as illustrating this primitive type. Not merely is the hydra-
JELLY-FISHES. 95
tuba the initial stage in the development of the special forms
of jelly-fishes already mentioned. It also represents the per-
manent form of the common hydra of our pools, and it recalls
the first beginnings of the zoophyte, ere the process of budding
has produced the compound and connected colony. In both
cases the jelly-fish type arises from the fixed zoophyte-stock,
and this latter originates, in turn, from the simpler type of
the hydra-tuba. If, therefore, speculation is content to be
guided by the light of facts as they stand, such theorising will
accept some primitive hydra-like animal as the root-stock of
the jelly-fish race. The free jelly-fishes, like pelagia, which
pulsate in all their independence of zoophytes, and in whose
development no hydra-tuba stage is found, represent, on this
theory, the most specialised and highly developed forms of the
group. In their development, the panoramic display of the
stages in their past history has been modified, and here and
there obliterated, through the operation of causes beyond our
ken. Their independence has been attained possibly through
better adaptation to the free life of the ocean, but their former
connection with the rooted zoophytes, and with past and gone
types of zoophyte life, cannot be doubted. Otherwise, the fact
that, before our waiting eyes to-day, zoophytes produce medusas,
and true jelly-fishes in turn exhibit a zoophyte stage in de-
velopment, has no meaning, and must prove, as hard facts do
to the prepossessed understanding, but stumbling-blocks and
causes of offence. Bound up in the history of a jelly-fish, we
thus find problems which directly concern the origin of the
whole universe of life. And it may well be maintained that it
is in these mental pathways, which, from a study of common-
place things, lead outwards to the great questions of organic
existence, that the highest aims and greatest triumphs of science
are to be sought and found.
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER
LIFE.
DESPITE the polite attentions of the housemaid's broom and
the avenging duster wielded by that enemy to dust and cob-
webs, an indefatigable member of the spider fraternity has
been busily engaged in a snug corner of my room for some
days past. Day by day some new phase or feature has been
apparent in the work whereon Madame Arachne has been em-
ploying her energies and time. The ruthless duster has more
than once despoiled the fabric which took two days' hard
labour to rear ; and to my certain knowledge the broom on one
occasion has annihilated a structure the manufacture of which
cost probably as much labour and ingenuity to devise, as did
the production of that aesthetic coloured print in which the
goddess of the duster is arrayed. But the household deities
possess their own peculiar views concerning the selection of
a legitimate site for a spider's dwelling-place. It is, in truth,
questionable whether Arachne and her web would be accorded
any place whatever on the face of the earth, were the notions
and proclivities of our practical Lares and Penates consulted in
the matter. Purpose, design, and use are paramount ideas in
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 97
the mind accustomed to " set things straight " in our homes
and by our hearths ; and flies in the matter of provisions and
edibles, or spiders in the matter of cobwebs, naturally meet
with scant ceremony from practical hands and hearts of non-
zoological type. Even admitting that purposive design and a
plain use of the Arachne-family, as well as a moral for the
infant mind, are embodied in the well-known nursery rhyme
detailing the results of a spider's invitation to a frivolous and
unsuspecting fly, the web-makers are not regarded as well-
favoured creatures on account of their rapacious propensities,
and from their enmity to the buzzing nuisance of the household.
But both insect and Arachnidan are assailed and assaulted by
aid of the lethal broom and duster and by the seductive papier-
mouche ; and captor and captured thus meet with the stern and
uncompromising fate which ofttimes environs the footsteps of
lower as well as of higher existence.
Gazing at Madam Arachne's handiwork in the corner of
the room, one's thoughts run off, if not exactly at a tangent,
at least into by-ways which lead to the shallows of philosophy,
and occasionally into the depths of profound reflection likewise.
Speculation becomes rife regarding the source, origin, and
growth of the constructive powers and of the trained faculties
which decide the site and build the house of Arachne and Co.,
spinners and fabricators, of Britain and the South, East, and
"West generally although, be it remarked, the branches of the
firm which flourish in the South are more notable even than
the representatives which carry on the business within the
limits of "the adjacent islands of Great Britain and Ireland,"
as the Free Kirk minister in the Hebrides denominated these
realms. Then to such sage reflections, succeed others not less
profound perhaps, regarding the spiders' place in nature, and
the nearest relatives of such " mechanical persons," as Bob Eoy,
gS THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
to Bailie Nicol Jarvie's extreme disgust, termed the spinners
and weavers of his day. And again one's thoughts speed side-
wise to consider other makers of threads and fabrics, dwelling
some by land and some by sea. Finally comes the determina-
tion to afford some light, if not sweetness, in the matter of
the spinners of lower life. And so, here ends this rambling
introduction to a brief chronicle of spiders and spinners, of
cobwebs and silken frabrics, and other materials, known as a
rule only to the cunning and industrious few.
Once upon a time a Lydian purple-dyer had a beauteous
daughter, Arachne by name, and she, so runs the legend, was a
spinner of no mean powers. But vanity of her deft art was
the fair Arachne's weakness, and she was led to challenge
Minerva to a trial of skill in spinning. Such a challenge,
coming even from a demi-goddess, not to speak of a humble
mortal, would have been rudeness enough ; and, resenting the
liberty, Minerva is said to have changed the purple-dyer's
daughter into a spider, in which guise, it is to be presumed,
she would have scope and use for her weaving powers. Thus
much for mythology, and by way of accounting for the zoolo-
gist's reasons for including the spider tribes and their near
relatives the mites and scorpions under the common term Arach-
nida. In the popular zoology which grows with us from our
earliest days, a spider is, of course, an " insect." Zoologically,
Arachne and her neighbours claim a rank of higher nature than
that assigned to the bulk of the insect class ; and it may be
well, as facilitating our recognition of the personal history of
the spinners in question, to glance at the head-marks of their
race. A spider's head, to begin with an important region of its
body, does not exist as a separate and distinct portion of its
body, as in an insect, but is amalgamated with its chest. Like
the insects, the spider and her neighbours possess legs which
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 99
are attached to the chest region alone, and which do not belong
to the tail as in the nearly related lobsters and their relations.
The tail or " abdomen " of the spider is moreover unjointed, and
in this latter respect differs from the tails of the insect tribe ;
and whilst the latter possesses a pair of " feelers " technically
termed " antennas " springing from the head, the spider ex-
hibits a total want of such appendages, although persons skilled
in the science of comparisons (which the learned name " homo-
logy") are prone to consider that the big jaws of a spider,
carrying the poison-fangs, are in reality the altered " feelers " of
the Arachnidan fraternity. Be this as it may, feelers are plainly
wanting in the spinners and weavers; and another point of
difference between the insects and the latter is found in the
total absence of wings ; although it is noteworthy that certain
insects, by no means of lowly grade, in addition to those ot
plebeian and parasitic habits, want wings entirely. Nor must
we neglect to note that the Arachnidans are the gainers in
respect of legs, which invariably number eight. The veriest
aristocrat of an insect never possesses more than six. legs, at
least when fully grown ; for it is permissible neither from an
esthetic nor from a scientific point of view to take into account
the fleshy stumps with which some insects, in the days of their
infancy, and when appearing as the Epicurean caterpillars, are
provided. In the matter of breathing as well, the Arachnidans
bear off the palm in respect of their possessing certain peculiar
bags placed in the sides of their bodies, filled with delicate
folds or leaves, and named pulmonary sacs or lung sacs. The
insect breathes by a curious arrangement of air-tubes, branch-
ing everywhere throughout its body; so that the spider possesses
a more localised and a better-defined breathing apparatus
although a close likeness to the features of the insect in this
latter respect, that of breathing, may exist amongst Arachni-
ioo THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
dans themselves. Last of all, amongst characters in insects
which spiders lack, we may place the compound eyes of the
former. Our Arachnidans have simple eyes, consisting of a
few usually some half-dozen, or at most eight specks scat-
tered over the front part of the body ; but they never possess
the great masses of visual organs we familiarly see distending the
sides of the head in the fly and other insects, and which consti-
tute veritable wonders, upon which the entomologically-minded
amongst us are never weary of expatiating in learned discourse.
So much for the personnel and distinguishing features of
Arachne and her neighbours. A similar inquiry into the dis-
position and private character of the Arachnidan species would
reveal much that was puzzling, and not a little that might
prove inexplicable, even in these days of ready theorising and
explanatory speculation. Take as an example the domestic
life of Madame Tegenaria domestica, as the lady-person domi-
ciled in the corner of the room is named. There can exist no
reasonable doubt indeed, there are no grounds whatever for
doubting the statement that Madame is thoroughly paramount,
and that Mr. Tegenaria domestica, like not a few male animals
inhabiting the highest spheres of society, is practically a non-
entity, and might, without very great loss to Arachnidan society,
be regarded as practically non-existent. The gentleman in
question, like erratic humans too much given to club-life, is
rarely, if ever, seen within his domestic circle; and the
difficulty connected with his movements and existence is not
merely when, but where he takes his walks abroad. The lady-
spiders are, indeed, a race of viragoes pure and simple. The
most enthusiastic students of Arachnidan ways have never
described those of the female sex as bland; and it is by no
means a mythical or supposititious statement that the hen-
pecked husbands are not merely frequently mauled in unmerciful
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 101
fashion, but are actually devoured by their mates.* This is
truly a horrible state of matters, but it is nevertheless true ;
and Arachnidan society appears tacitly to justify the extreme
procedure last mentioned, and to regard the mysterious disap-
pearance of a husband as an event which the lady most
interested is entitled to regard with equanimity, if not as an
utterly uninteresting proceeding.
But if Madame Tegenaria and her blood relations are thus
given to husband-slaughter in a wholesale way, it must not be
imagined that the social feelings or affections are wholly unrepre-
sented in Arachnidan society. There is a tacit agreement among
the best friends and biographers of the race, that in the matter of
affection for their progeny Mesdames Tegenarise and friends are
models of parents. The young appear to be tended and fed with
scrupulous care, and the race before us presents thus a certain
marked contrast to such cruel mothers as the queen bees which
kill their daughters, and to the workers which kill the drones.
The male spiders by all accounts are peripatetic and erratic in
their ways, and wander about from nest to nest in a thoroughly
Bohemian fashion. Statisticians inform us that the males as a
rule preponderate in the Arachnidan race an apparently wise
provision, considering the frequency with which they are slaugh-
tered by their mates. In one or two families, however, the female
sex appears to predominate as in higher life; and Thorell, of Up-
sala, has left it on record that in his opinion the lady-spiders on
the whole exceed their mates in numbers. Blackwall, in his
work on the spiders, indicates that the males are darker-coloured,
as a rule, than the females ; but there are cases where the male
and female appear as exact counterparts one of another.
* De Geer, as quoted by Kirby and Spence, tells us that he has
witnessed an unfortunate husband "seized by the object of his atten-
tions, enveloped by her in a web, and then devoured ; a sight which,"
he adds, " filled him with horror and indignation,"
102 THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
A chapter of high interest might be written on the court-
ship of the Arachnidan race, involving, as do the matrimonial
intents of the race, many curious features. In one or two
species of spiders, the gentlemen possess the power of emitting
a curious chirping sound, the ladies being, wonderful to relate,
voiceless : a quality upon which Anacreon, as will be remem-
bered, congratulated the insect-Cicadas, since their wives as
is really the case are dumb. There is no doubt that such a
musical apparatus, consisting of a roughened patch on the tail
against which the chest is rubbed, is intended as a species of
loving blandishment to captivate Mesdames. And Monsieur
Theridion, approaching the domicile of Mademoiselle Theridion,
softly twangs his guitar, and thus announces at once, and
through the appropriate medium of the divine art, his inten-
tions and emotions. Such a procedure reaches, it is true, in
the insect group, a higher stage of culture than in the Arachni-
dan fraternity ; but its occurrence anywhere in lower life affords
a foundation for the belief, that courtship by serenade and
the blandishments of Orpheus had plain precedents ages ago,
in the loves of the insects and their allied kith and kin. So
also, it has been alleged by high authority that spiders have
been attracted by music. If this latter assertion be correct,
it places the idea of a defined purpose underlying the sounds of
Theridion on a basis of more than ordinary probability and
reasonableness. Thus, in the matter of woman's rights alone,
the Arachnidans are all that, and perhaps a good deal more
than, our own lady-liberationists could wish for; whilst there
is no doubt that in attention to domestic duties, and in the
ordering of household ways and domestic life as occasionally
proved by the experiences of mankind the shrew may take
precedence of some more amiable and milder-tempered wives.
The ways of spider-existence can only be fully compre-
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE, 103
bended when we dip into the general anatomy of the group.
Even the nature of the threads and thrums with the mention
of which this rambling chronicle was begun, may be understood
solely by the light thrown on the spinning-apparatus by a
popular and short lecture on comparative anatomy. Let us
thus firstly examine the mouth and its belongings, by way of
satisfying a normal curiosity regarding the well-known stin^
and poison of the race. The jaws of a spider, like those of a
beetle, number four a large and a small pair. The large pair
technically the " mandibles " are hooked at their tips ; the
hooks being the poison-" fangs," in each of which the duct or
tube, leading from the poison-gland in the head, terminates.
When I discern Madame Tegenaria in her web, busily engaged
in mastering the struggles of the fly which has just become
entangled in the deceitful snare, I can predict that there will
be both scant mercy and " Jeddart justice " shown to the hap-
less victim. Soon the poison-fang will be plunged into its
body; the deadly secretion will pass rapidly to mingle with
the vital fluid, and Musca, domestica's struggles will speedily
cease. The bite of any known species of spider is certainly
neither fatal nor dangerous to human life. At the very most,
a spider's wound might produce an inflamed puncture ; but the
virus is not potent enough to affect human muscles, nerves, or
tissues at large. Even the famed Tarantula itself, is a delusion
and a snare. The Tarantula spider is the Lycosa tarantula of
Italy and Spain, whose bite was long believed to produce
a species of dancing madness imitated, of course, in the
fashionable Tarantelles wherewith young aspirants in pianoforte
practice torture at once their own fingers, the instrument in
question, and the ears and minds of their hearers. The Taran-
tula is one of the wandering or peripatetic members of its race.
Making no web, it hides beneath stones, and like a lurking
.104 THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
bandit pounces upon its prey when occasion offers. " Tarantism,"
as the condition alluded to is named, unquestionably does exist
as a species of uncontrollable muscular spasm; but the asso-
ciation of the affection with the bite of the spider in question
is simply mythical, and rests on no certain or demonstrable
basis. Arachnidans, however, are well provided with means of
defence and offence suiting their life. The large tropical species
can sting small birds to their death; and, in any case, the
spider is a superior creature in this respect to its clumsy
scorpion neighbour, which wanders hither and thither with its
tail curled over its back by way of protecting its sting from
injury : whilst a somewhat foolish trait of scorpion character is
also known, wherein, when made to sting itself, the animal
succumbs to its own injury.
But we are veering round gradually towards the threads
and thrums, to the spinners and spun; and the inquiry, "Where
is the loom, and how does it work ? " may now be said to await
us. Let authority iu the guise of the zoologist reply. Looking
at the tail-extremity of a spider, we can readily perceive by aid
of a strong lens from two to four pairs of conical projections.
These are named the spinnerets. Each is but a much altered
limb, and indeed, were proof of this latter statement required,
we might point to one group of Arachnidans (Hersilla), in
which the three pairs of spinnerets are seen to present a
thoroughly leg-like nature. What, then, is the function of
these spinnerets, which exist to the number of three pairs in
Madame Tegenaria in the corner? The reply is, that they are
used to reel off the silk wherewith the domicile is woven and
built. Microscopically examined, you would find that each
spinneret is in reality composed of a multitude of very fine
tubes, which open at its tip. Next let us inquire as to the
mode of production of the thread. Our spiders are by no means
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 105
the only weavers in nature. Those lazy gourmands the cater-
pillars, which cause the gardener's heart to grow faint when he
contemplates their Sybaritic ravages on the choicest of his
leaves, spin a thread likewise, and afford us " floss " silk when
the fabrication happens to be an infant moth belonging to one
or other of the silk-producing species. And removed from the
insect class altogether, and passing into the depths of the sea,
we may still find spinners enough and to spare. The mussels
of our own coasts, and the Pinnas of the Mediterranean Sea,
present us with instances of animal weavers in plenty, and
with examples of the manufacture of threads sometimes of a
nature durable in the extreme.
But in insect or mollusc, in Arachnidan or caterpillar, there
is a striking similarity in the manner of production of threads
and fabrics. The material wherewith Madame Tegenaria spins
is secreted or manufactured from her blood, like every other
product of the animal economy, by special organs which receive
the name of " glands." These silk-glands manufacture a dense
semi-fluid matter, which, so long as it remains within the gland,
retains its fluid nature. When, however, it is exposed to the
air, it becomes more tenacious, and is then capable of being
pressed out through the infinitesimally fine tubes we have seen
to compose the spinnerets. The conversion of a glutinous fluid
into a thread is strictly paralleled by the familiar illustration
of glue in a glue-pot. So long as the glue is kept heated on
the fire, it is fluid. But if, when the process of liquefaction has
proceeded to a certain stage, we lift the glue on the brush, we
may draw out the semi-fluid mass in the form of threads into
which it has rapidly cooled by exposure to the air. And so
with the threads of Arachnidans. But if the spinnerets are
perforated with numerous tubes through which the fluid silk is
drawn to form threads, why do we not perceive the numerous
106 THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
threads in question? The zoologist replies that the many
threads are united to form the single strand with which the
web is formed and other operations of spider-life carried on.
Think for a moment of the extreme fineness of this apparently
single, but in reality compound, rope of Madame Tegenaria, for
instance, and then try to imagine, if you can, the delicacy of
the four hundred odd strands of which it is composed ; or hie
you to Madame Epeira in the garden, and try to conceive how
infinitesimally slim must be the thousand or so threads which
make up her single strand itself a mere gossamer string with
which the summer breeze plays at will, and which even a
gentle gust of wind mocks to its destruction. Scientific ima-
gining has its limits, like the thoughts which run at will on
mountains of vanity in common, life ; but in the face of the
fineness of spiders' threads, we may well think of a boundary,
not to the indivisibility of matter, but to our powers of follow-
ing matter into its lesser and microscopic phases.
As Arachne spins her fabric, so insects spin their threads,
and molluscs weave their thrums, as we shall see. But the
manner in which this raw material the thread is wound and
woven to form the domiciles of the spider tribe, awaits our
further thought. Out in the garden exist plenty of spinners
belonging to a very notable family the Epeiras whose web-
spinning habits you may watch, provided you can extricate
yourself sufficiently early from the toils of Morpheus, and sally
forth in the early summer morning bent on a zoological study.
You will then see Epeira diademata hard at work house-
building and repairing, like a busy contractor with his hands
full. Engaged on a new venture in the way of domicile, Epeira
may be seen bustling hither and thither over the twigs and
branches of the shrub whereto the web is to be attached, and,
having fixed upon a site, may be seen suddenly to drop from
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 107
the twig, and as suddenly to be arrested in some mysterious
fashion in mid air. This is no mere acrobatic exhibition, but a
preliminary measure probably having for its object the drawing
of a mass of silken threads from the spinnerets. Soon the morn-
ing breezes waft the threads towards the projecting tips of neigh-
bouring branches, to which they adhere ; and when the threads
have become fixed, you will see Epeira hauling at the threads
with her fore-legs like some deft sailor, by way of testing their
strength. Selecting her special thread, Epeira will now pro-
bably cut adrift the remainder, and will turn her attention
towards the stability of her line. This first thread runs across
the centre or thereabouts of the future web for you remember
that Epeira spins a geometric house and from the point of
attachment of this first thread, Epeira will pass to fix the line,
spun as she runs to point after point, and thus to mark out the
circumference of her habitation. Next are formed diagonal
lines across the outer circle already made ; and soon a series of
radiating threads is formed, and the outline or skeleton of the
edifice is completed. In her journeys you will see, and I hope
admire, how cleverly Epeira, like a skilful rope-walker, travels
back to the centre of the web, along the line she has spun, and
you will notice also how her feet, or rather her toes, serve as
most admirable tools and combs in arranging the threads and
in fixing them as well.
The next portion of Epeira's task consists in the formation
of the series of circular threads which pass from each of the
spokes or radii of her wheel-like outline, and which convert
the spaces between the spokes into veritable ladders. Proceed-
ing to the centre, Epeira begins to spin a spiral thread, the
whorls of which grow larger and larger as she approaches the
circumference of her net. Bound and round she weaves, cross-
ing the radii in her spiral track, and deftly fastening the thread
108 THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
to each spoke as she crosses it, with a minute globule of some
glutinous fluid. The larger the spider, the greater will be the
space between the spirals of the web ; and on approaching
the circumference of her domicile, a second spiral thread seems
to replace the first which began in the centre. This outer
thread, as you may see by inspecting a web, is perfectly be-
dizened with globules of a gummy fluid, which, like the sun-
dew's glittering secretion, will fast bind the unwary insect that
comes in contact with the snare.* And thus Epeira makes her
web, and lays a snare which Nature perfectly approves of, and
authorises as one way of gaining an easy livelihood, and of
placing the operator and builder well forward in the inevitable
" struggle for existence."
But showers of rain and dust-storms sadly annoy our Epeira.
Often a single shower will materially damage a web, and set
the owner to work biting through the inner threads, which she
rolls into a ball and then drops to the ground, and thereafter
makes new spirals as before. Or dust-laden and wet, the
domicile may be useless as a snare, and Epeira, deserting a
ruined home, constructs a new dwelling-place, and appears in
' * Speaking of these globules, Mr. Blackwall writes : "An estimate
of the number of viscid globules distributed on the elastic spiral line
in a net of Epeira apodisa of a medium size will convey some idea of
the elaborate operations performed by the Geometric Spiders in the
construction of their snares. The mean distance between two con-
tiguous radii is about seren-tenths of an inch ; if, therefore, the number
7 be multiplied by 20, the mean number of viscid globules which occur
on one-tenth of an inch of the elastic spiral line at the ordinary degree
of tension, the product will be 140, the mean number of globules de-
posited on seven-tenths of an inch of the elastic spiral line ; this product
multiplied by 24, the mean number of circumvolutions formed by the
elastic spiral line, 3,360, (as) the mean number of globules contained
between two radii ; which multiplied by 2C, the mean number of radii,
produces 87,360, the total number of viscid globules in a finished net
of average dimensions."
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 109
the genuine excitement of work to forget the troubles of the
past.*
Watch Epeira, as she lies in wait for prey, realising Sir
John Davies' apt description of her attitude :
A subtle spider, which doth sit
In middle of her web which spreadeth wide ;
If aught do touch the utmost thread of it,
She feels it instantly on every side.
Firm poised sits Madame in the centre of her geometric spiral,
usually head downwards, but listening intently albeit that we
know nothing of her ears, which, perchance, like those of the
lobster, may exist somewhere in or near the belongings or ap-
pendages of her head. With that sense of touch praised by him
of Twickenham as so "exquisitely fine," and with each foot firmly
set on a radius or spoke of her web, Epeira waits for the coming
fly. Soon the insect comes. A vibration passes along the cords
from the sticky circumference where Musca is entangled in
extreme perplexity of mind. At once, Epeira is on the alert.
Seizing several radiating threads, she sharply jerks them ; and
if the subsequent struggles of the captured one convince her
that she has landed her prey, she will rapidly traverse the
web towards the outside edge, seize the prey in her jaws, and
instil her potent venom. Thereafter she will enclose her victim
in a silken shroud, and dispose of him in some quiet corner,
whither in due time she may retire to feast upon the juices
and fluids of his frame. You will have witnessed in such a
* Judging, indeed, from the rapidity with which Epeira works,
there should exist much leisure time and breathing space for the race,
if the effects of work and the dissipation of energy in the Arachnidan
bear any relation to those seen in the human species. Mr. Blackwall
says an Epeira apodisa will -complete its web in about forty minutes,
provided it meets with no interruption ; and the rapidity with which
spinnerets and legs move, and the work of thread-production proceeds,
may best be proved by interviewing the artisans at home.
I io THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
study, how greatly Epeira and, indeed, all Arachnidans depend
on their sense of touch for information regarding the outer
world. We know little or nothing of the seeing powers of those
insignificant eye-specks scattered over the back of her head and
chest, but we may readily conceive that the acute sense of
touch, resident not merely in the palpi or feelers of the mouth,
but in the legs as well, and which responds to every vibration,
will very fully supply to the spider race the place of the visual
and other sensory organs of higher existence. Not a movement
appears to be made by the ordinary Arachnidan without the
accompanying work of spinning a thread. From place to place
Epeira moves, quickly and deftly too, but ever accompanied by
the thread which she who runs, spins. A friendly call a
practice which, by the way, is not much in vogue in Arachnidan
society would be performed by aid of the thread, the one ex-
tremity of which is secured at home, whilst the other end merges
into the as yet unformed strands of the spinneret. Along this
thread the return journey is made. From a height Epeira drops
safely and securely by means of the well-nigh invisible strand,
and up this thread she clambers with agility when danger looms
or necessity drives. Thus does the Arachnidan literally live
"along the 'line," and it is perhaps hard to conceive of any
exactly similar mode of progression in the animal world.
Imagine an aerial humanity proceeding, on business or pleasure
bent, by means of clothes-lines. Or think of the announce-
ment made by a polite attendant that Madame Tegenaria'a
"line " was at the door, and waiting to take her home ; whilst,
instead of the complaint that " Madame Epeira's carriage stops
the way," it would be said that the lady's " line " had got
entangled with the threads of other members of society, and
that the owner would oblige by speedily attending to its due
arrangement.
THREADS AND THRUMS IN' LOWER LIFE, in
The phases of Arachnidaa society might, if pursued and de-
scribed in detail, lead us very far from our room and our garden ;
but there remain for notice several features connected, firstly,
with the varying habits of spinning and weaving seen in the
class, and secondly, with the nature of the instincts which
the race of Epeiras, Tegenarias, and their friends, regarded as a
whole, exhibit. Place for utilitarian considerations, and for the
domestic economy of spiders' webs. During last century Le
Bon of Languedoc wove spiders' silk into various articles, such
as gloves and stockings. Bermuda ladies use spiders' silk for
sewing, such strands being thick and strong. But spider-nature
is by no means docile, and the domestication and civilization
of the errant race to become respectable fabricators of silk for
the use of man is simply a dream of -the future, which may or
may not be realised. Only this much may be said, that Dr.
B. GL Wilder of America asserts that the Nephila plumipes of
the Southern States of America affords a silk which, could it be
procured in sufficient quantities, would be a perfectly market-
able commodity. It is the above-named species of Nephila
which in tropic forests constructs nets of strength sufficient to
capture small birds, and from this genus the Bermuda dames
obtain sewing thread. The lady Nephilas are the workers ;
Messieurs the Nephilas are minute as compared with their
spouses ; and from what we already know of the degraded state
of male society in the Arachnidan race, it would be too much
to expect these wretched creatures to emulate the ways and
industry of their literally giant partners.
A ramble through pastures Arachnidan, calls up in imagina-
tion not a few curious and interesting forms to which a walk
through the nearest museum of large dimensions, and a glance
at the Arachnidan cases, will serve as a practical commentary
and illustration. A summer day and a green, meadow, with its
112 THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
waterpool by the clump of osiers, rises to mental view as we
recall to mind the Argyroneta we saw there this last being a
spider which takes to water as its natural habitat, and which
builds a nest and cocoon beneath the surface in the shape of a
veritable diving-bell. Here this amphibian lady lives and
thrives, ascending periodically to the surface of the pool to en-
tangle a bubble of air in the hairs with which her body is
covered, and to descend with this atmospheric supply to her
nest. Then, also, we are reminded of the " Wanderers," which,
making no web or nest, lurk beneath stones and rush out to
seize their prey, like the Tarantula of evil fame. And we
remember the Leaping Spiders (Salticus) ; so named because
they progress with a leaping gait, and recall to mind certain
insect-brethren of the hearth and meadow. Nor must we
neglect to mention the Mygale tribe or Mason Spiders, which
construct the trap-door abodes so familiar in Southern Europe ;
excavating a deep pit which is lined with the silken material,
and closed by a cunningly contrived and cleverly concealed lid.
"Whilst, lastly, may be mentioned Madame Clotho, well named
after the Fate, since of the spinners and weavers she might well
represent the chief, or an embodiment of Arachne herself.
Here you will find a weaver which constructs a tent of a fine
taffeta, secures it to the ground with silken cords, and stains
the outside so as to mimic accurately the hue of the surround-
ing objects. Herein the Clotho family lives ; herein the young
are reared ; and herein are exercised those instincts which
puzzle us the more as we continue to dwell upon the variety
and perfection of their work.
So we bid farewell to the spinners and weavers, en famine,
and approach at least part of the philosophy of their being.
The spider may, in one sense, be well compared to a headless
insect; the organs and parts constituting the insect head
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 113
always a well-defined part of the economy in question are
but imperfectly developed in the spider race. But on all
grounds, our spider is an animal of much higher instincts than
the average insect. Wary to a fault, strategic in the highest
degree, cunning in every detail of life, active and mechanically
minded such qualities, I repeat, would naturally be regarded
as the outcome and work of a nervous system higher than that
of the careless insect the current of whose existence, as a rule,
flows evenly along. Now, in nature, there exists such prin-
ciples as type and likeness, whereby each animal belonging to
any given group, preserves, beneath variations in form, the
typical or primary disposition of parts seen in the least modified
members of its class. Worms, insects,"centipedes, crabs, lobsters,
and a host of other and allied creatures, thus fall into one and
the same group. In the worm and insect, the nervous system
exists typically as a double chain of nerves and nerve-knots
lying along the floor of the body. Now, Arachnidan society,
in virtue of its relations to the insect type, is bound to possess
a nervous system of like character ; and so we find the guid-
ing apparatus of the spider to be situated below. But when we
scan the form of that nervous system we seem to lose sight of
the double or single chain arrangement just mentioned as
characteristic of the insect-class and its allies, for we notice
the spider's nerves to form a great mass in the floor of its head
and chest. How and why has this altered arrangement been
produced ? The answer is clear. To produce a nervous system
of higher type than that of the insect, two courses were open
to Dame Nature. She might have supplied Arachne with
additional nerves and nerve-knots; but such a procedure, as
we have just observed, is against the rules, which forbid any
great departure from a given type. Or, secondly, Nature
might, by concentrating otherwise scattered nerve-centres, give
i
114 THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
increased nerve-power. And this latter alternative has been
duly pursued in the case of our spiders. Increased centralisa-
tion of nerves has afforded increased nerve-power, and hence
we perceive a natural basis for replying to the query concern-
ing the origin of the higher powers of Arachne as compared
with the average insect. That spiders and insects may have
had a common origin is by no means a far-fetched supposition.
Insects, as they are entitled to claim by reason of their older
fossil history, may take the first place; but it is not difficult to
conceive that from some primitive insect-like stock the tribe of
spinners and weavers descended in the far-back ages. Whilst
here and there, as in the spinning insect-caterpillars, or in that
poor relation of the centipedes named Peripatus which spins
threads when alarmed, by way, presumably, of showing its fear
and disgust we also meet with traces of a development of
spinning powers, imitating, in feeble degree only, the more
perfect workmanship of the beings which claim the purple-
dyer's daughter as their patron and mythological heroine.
But little space remains wherein the spinners of threads and
thrums amongst the shell-fish may receive a just meed of atten-
tion. Still, to pass over these molluscan fabricators in silence
would seem to cast a slur on their handiwork, although their
labours may seem but dull and commonplace after the lively
land-weavers of nets and webs. Perhaps the best-known spinner
of threads on our own coasts is the common mussel, which one
may pick up by the dozen on rocky coasts, having bound to itself,
by means of its strong threads, stones and shells, often making
up a mass many times its own weight and bulk. Try to
detach a mussel from a secure crevice in a rock, where it lies
hidden along with numerous neighbours, and your weary fingers
will attest the strength of the mussel's " beard," as its collection
of threads is popularly named the "byssus" of those whose
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 115
business it is to lecture upon big and little fish alike. Whence
does the " beard " come, and how is it formed ? Open your
mussel for the more familiar oyster has no beard, at least when
adult, and prefers to fix itself in its "bed" directly, by implant-
ing its shell in its native mud. You will then see a prominent
organ of conical shape, and deeply grooved in appearance. This
is the "foot" of your mollusc, an organ more familiarly seen in
the broad walking-disc of that retiring mollusc the snail or slug.
And it is a " foot " identical in nature with that of the mussel
by means of which the familiar cockle leaps over its sandy
habitation, and by aid of which the Solen or razor-shell burrows
swiftly and deeply into the obscurity of the sand.
From the base of the foot hangs the bundle of stout threads
which this foot moulds and forms. The "foot" is thus the
weaver of the mussel's beard, and the manner of secretion of
the threads takes place in a fashion quite analogous to that
in which the spider makes its thread. From special glands
forming part of the mussel's belongings, comes the same semi-
fluid material, which, run into the groove in the foot, sets
therein as a firm thread. This thread is drawn out of the foot
by the retraction of that organ, and another thread is rapidly
formed, until the "beard" grows apace, and the mussel has
tied itself to something, or has tied something to itself, as we
have seen.
The " beard " of the mussel as a zoological curiosity is in-
teresting enough, no doubt, but that it could by any stretch of
the imagination be regarded as subserving an important function
in defending man's structures against the ravages of time and
tide, is altogether an unlikely supposition. Listen, however,
to a curious recital, quoted by Mr. Gosse in his manual of the
" Mollusca" : " At the town of Bideford in Devonshire, there is
a long bridge of twenty-four arches across the Torridge river,
116 THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE.
near its junction with the Taw. At this bridge the tide flows
so rapidly that it cannot be kept in repair by mortar. The
corporation, therefore, keep boats in employ to bring mussels to
it, and the interstices of the bridge are filled by hand with these
mussels. It is supported from being driven away by the tide
entirely by the strong threads these mussels fix to the stone-
work ; and by an Act or grant, it is a crime liable to transport-
ation for any person to remove these mussels, unless in the
presence and by the consent of the corporation trustees." Such
a history is both curious and interesting, and in the absence of
any contradiction Mr. Gosse's " Manual " bears date 1854.
the correctness of the narrative may be assumed, if only from
an inductive inference concerning the strength of the byssus of
the mussels on the beach. The story, besides, presents but
another and perhaps novel illustration of the old axiom, L'union
fait la force.
Utilitarianism may again claim us when we find that a near
neighbour of the mussel the Mediterranean Pinna manu-
factures a silky byssus in sufficient quantity to enable the
Sicilians to weave it into gloves and stockings. These latter
are rather articles de luxe, however, than garments of wear, and
are costly withal ; the latter fact depending on the nature of
their origin and the trouble of manufacture. Pope Benedict
XV. received in 1754 from certain of his subjects a pair of
stockings of Pinna's " beard," and the event was regarded as
testifying to the worth of the present and to the dexterity of
the manufacturers a dexterity which was certainly equalled
in respect of its ingenuity by Dame Nature herself in the
production of the raw material.
This history of threads and thrums draws to a close.
Madame Tegenaria is busy in her corner still. It was she who
inspired this subject and its title, and I think of bestirring
THREADS AND THRUMS IN LOWER LIFE. 117
myself, in common gratitude, to capture that buzzing insect,
whose disturbing hum must reach Arachnidan society in the
corner, and fill it with vain hopes of a goodly banquet. I shall,
at any rate, say farewell to the history of Tegenaria and her
race for the nonce. Some other day Arachnidan ways and
customs may engage an hour of leisure-time. In her corner
Tegenaria may live and prosper, it is true ; but the inevitable
duster looms in the distance, and of the fate which may possibly
await our deft spinner who can tell ?
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
THE medical student who, in answer to an examiner anxious to
ascertain the exact amount of the lad's knowledge concerning
fishes, replied, that " he knew them all from the limpet to the
whale," must indeed be credited with a larger share of candour
than of zoological science. The limpet is a shell " fish " by
courtesy at the best, but the whale, public opinion notwithstand-
ing, is not a fish in any sense of the term. The most that can
be said of the whale in this respect is that it is fish-like ; and,
admitting that appearances in zoological society are as deceptive
as in ordinary existence, it behoves us to be cautious in accept-
ing outward resemblances as indicative of real and veritable
affinity. A popular lesson in natural history, then, teaches us
that a whale is a mammal or quadruped that is, apart from the
mere etymology of the word, it belongs to the quadruped-class.
It possesses but two legs, or rather " arms," it is true, aud these
members do not resemble limbs. But it is a quadruped not-
withstanding its deficiencies in this respect ; and it agrees in all
the characters which are found to distinguish the class to which
man himself belongs that of the mammalia. These characters
it may be advantageous very briefly to detail, by way of pre-
liminary to the general study of whales and their nearest
relations. Thus, firstly, they are warm-blooded animals, a
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 119
statement which must be taken as meaning that their blood is
of a temperature considerably higher than that of the medium
in which they live. The fish, on the other hand, is a cold-
blooded creature. Its temperature is only slightly higher than
that of the surrounding water, and in this respect it agrees with,
all invertebrate animals and with the frogs and reptiles of its
own sub-kingdom. Next in order, may be noticed the agree-
ment of the whale with the quadruped in the matter of body-
covering. The covering of the latter consists of hairs. Although
the body of the whale cannot be described, by any stretch of
the imagination, as having hair, the presence of a few bristles
around the mouth-extremity sufficiently indicates the nature of
its outer garment ; whilst, before birth, the body-covering in
some whales is tolerably plentiful, but is soon shed, leaving the
hide thick, shining, and hairless. The microscopist might
inform us that the blood of the whale presents the same charac-
ters as that of other mammals, and possesses red corpuscles or
coloured bodies, which, unlike those of the fish, reptile, and
bird, have no central particle or " nucleus." And whilst the
heart of the fish is a comparatively simple engine of propulsion,
consisting of two contractile chambers or cavities, the whale's
heart will be found like that of man and other quadrupeds in all
essential details of its structure. It is thus a four-chambered
organ doing double duty, in that it sends blood not only through
the system, but also to the lungs for purification.
The mention of lungs, as the breathing organs of whales, at
once introduces us to a new field of inquiry concerning the
habits and life of the aquatic monsters.. A popular notion
exists that of necessity a water-living animal must be a water-
breather. The idea offish-existence and of the manner in which
fishes breathe evidently reigns paramount in the present case.
That an animal may be completely aquatic in its habits, and
120 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
yet breathe air directly from the atmosphere, and after a like
procedure to that witnessed in human respiration, is a notable
fact. A water-newt, despite its aquatic habits, ascends
periodically to the surface of the water to breathe, and seals,
walruses, and whales agree in that they are truly lung-breathers,
and possess gills at no period of their existence. True, a gill
differs from a lung only in that it is capable of exposing the
blood circulating through it to the air which is entangled
or mechanically suspended in the water. Atmospheric air, con-
taining the vitalising oxygen for the renewal and purification of
the blood, is the great desideratum on the part of all animals,
high and low alike. And the gill and lung, therefore, differ
simply in the manner and method in which the blood in each is
brought in contact with the air, and not in the essential details
of their work. The whales are known to " blow," and the act
of " blowing " is simply the act of breathing to be more par-
ticularly noticed hereafter. Thus a whale or seal would be
drowned, as certainly as an ordinary quadruped would be
asphyxiated, were its periodical access to the atmosphere pre-
vented ; and the curious fact may here be mentioned that there
are also certain abnormal living fishes notably the climbing
perch and Ophiocephdli in India which, to use the words of a
writer, are as easily drowned as dogs k when denied access to the
air. There is little need to particularise any of the remaining
characters which demonstrate the whale's relationship to mam-
mals, and its difference in structural points from the fishes.
The young whale is thus not merely born alive, but is
nourished by means of the milk-secretion of the parent, and this
last evidence of direct connection with higher animals might of
itself be deemed a crucial test of the place and rank of the
whales in the animal series.
But, granting that in the whales we meet with true quadru-
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 121
peds, it may be well to indicate the chief points in which they
differ from their mammalian brethren at large. It may be
admitted, at the outset, that they present us with a very distinct
modification of the quadruped type. Their adaptation to a
water life is so complete, in truth, that it has destroyed to a
large extent the outward and visible signs of their relationship
with mammals. The body is thoroughly fish-like and tapers
towards the tail, where we meet with a tail-fin, which, however,
is set right across the body, and not vertically as in the fishes.
This latter difference, indeed, is a very prominent feature in
whale-structure. The limbs, as already remarked, are repre-
sented by the two fore-limbs alone. No trace of hinder-
extremities is to be perceived externally, and the anatomical
investigation of the skeleton reveals at the best the merest
rudiments of haunch-bones and of hind limbs in certain whales,
of which the well-known Greenland whale may be cited as an
example. A distinct character of the whales has been found
by naturalists of all periods in the " blowholes," or apertures
through which the whale is popularly supposed to " spout."
Thus we find on the upper surface of the head of a Greenland
whale a couple of these " blowholes," or " spiracles," as they
are also called. These apertures exist on the front of the snout
in the sperm whales, whilst in the porpoises, dolphins, and
their neighbours the blowhole is single, of crescentic shape, and .
placed on the top of the head. It requires but little exercise of
anatomical skill to indentify the "blowholes" of the whales
with the nostrils of other animals ; and it becomes an interesting
matter to trace the adaptation of the nostrils to the aquatic life
and breathing habits of these animals.
There are natural-history text-books still extant in which a
very familiar error regarding the " blowing " of the whales is
propagated an error which, like many other delusions of
122 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
popular kind, has become so fossilised, so to speak, that it is
difficult to convince believers of its falsity. A manual of
natural history, of no ancient date, lies before me as I write,
and when I turn to the section which treats of the whales, I find
an illustration of a Greenland whale, which is represented as
lying high and dry on the beach, but which, despite its stranded
state, appears in the act of vigorously puffing streams of water
from the blowholes on the top of its head. To say the least of
it, such an illustration is simply fictitious, and might safely be
discarded as of purely inventive kind, were it only from the
fact of its supposing a whale to be provided with some mysteri-
ous reservoir of water from which it could eject copious streams,
even when removed from the sea. The common notion re-
garding the " blowing " of the whale appears to be that which
credits the animal with inhaling large quantities of water into
its mouth, presumably in the act of nutrition. This water was
then said to escape into the nostrils, and to be ejected therefrom
in the act of blowing. The behaviour of a whale in the open
sea, at first sight favours this apparently simple explanation.
Careering along in the full exercise of its mighty powers, the
huge body is seen to dive and to reappear some distance off at
the surface, discharging from its nostrils a shower of water and
spray. The observation is correct enough as it stands, but the
interpretation of the phenomena is erroneous. Apart from the
anatomical difficulties in the way of explaining how water
from the mouth could escape in such large quantities, and so
persistently, into the nostrils, there is not merely an utter want
of purpose in this view of the act of " spouting," but we have
also to consider that this act would materially interfere with
the breathing of the animal. Hence a more rational explanation
of what is implied in the " blowing" of the whales rests on the
simple assertion that the water and spray do not in reality
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 123
proceed from the blowhole, but consist of water forced upwards
into the air by the expiratory effort of the animal. The whale
begins the expiratory or "breathing-out" action of its lungs
just before reaching the surface of the water, and the warm
expired air therefore carries up with it the water lying above
the head and blowholes of the ascending animal. That this
view is correct is rendered highly probable, not merely by the
observation of the breathing of young whales and porpoises kept
in confinement, but also by the fact that the last portion of the
"blow" consists of a white silvery spray or vapour, formed by
the rapid condensation of the warm air from the lungs as it
comes in contact with the colder atmosphere. The water
received into the mouth escapes at the sides of the mouth, and
does not enter the nostrils at all.
The furnishings of the mouth "of the whales include sundry
remarkable structures peculiar to a certain family circle of these
animals. Such are the " whalebone "-plates, furnishing a sub-
stance familiarly spoken of by everybody, [but exemplifying
at the same time a kind of material regarding the origin of
which a tacit ignorance, sanctioned by the stolid indifference of
many years' standing, commonly prevails. Whalebone, or
"baleen," is a commodity occurring in one group of these
animals only, this group being that of the whalebone whales
(Bcdcenidoi), of which the Greenland or right whale (Balcena
mysticetus) is the most noteworthy example. From this whale
the whalebone of commerce is derived ; other and nearly related
species such as the rorquals and furrowed whales possessing
the whalebone plates in a comparatively rudimentary state.
The baleen occurs in the mouth of these whales, and is disposed
in a curious fashion. It exists in the form of flat plates of
triangular shape, each plate being fixed by its base in the
palate. The inner side, or that next the centre of the mouth,
I2 4 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
is strongly fringed by frayed-out whalebone fibres, the outer
edge of each plate being straight. A double row of these
triangular plates of baleen depends in the form of two great
fringes from the palate of the whale ; and it would appear that
each baleen-plate is in reality a compound structure, being
composed of several smaller plates closely united. The largest
plates lie to the outer side of the series, and in a full-grown
whale may measure from eight to fourteen feet in length'
and as many as 250 or 300 plates may exist on each side cf
the palate.
The nature of these curious organs forms an appropriate sub-
ject of inquiry. It is exceedingly rare in nature to find an
animal provided with organs or structures which have no affinity
with organs in other and related animals. On the contrary, the
principle of likeness or " homology " teaches us that the most
unwonted and curious structures in animal existence are for the
most part modifications of common organs, or at any rate of
parts which are represented under varying forms and guises
in other animals. By aid of such a principle we discover that
the fore-limb of a horse, the wing of a bird, and the paddle of
a whale, are essentially similar in fundamental structure, and
in turn agree in all necessary details with the arm of man.
Through the deductions of this science of tracing likenesses and
correspondences between the organs of different animals, the
zoologist has been taught that the " air-bladder " or " sound " of
the fish is the forerunner of the lung of higher animals an
inference proved by the fact that in some fishes, such as the
curious lepidosirens, or "mud-fishes" of Africa and South
America, the air-bladder actually becomes lung-like, not merely
in form but in function also. By means of this useful guide to
the mysteries of animal structure we note that the bony box
in which the body of the tortoise or turtle is contained, is
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 125
formed by no new elements or parts, but consists chiefly of the
greatly modified backbone, and of the ribs and scales of these
animals. To what conclusion, then, does this same principle
lead us respecting the nature of the baleen-plates in the mouth
of the Greenland whale and its allies ? To a sufficiently certain,
but at the same time startling thought, is the reply of the com-
parative anatomist.
If we examine the structure of the human mouth, or that of
animals allied to man, we find that cavity to be lined by a
delicate layer named epithelium. This epithelium consists
really of a modification of the upper layer of the skin, and we
see this modification familiarly in the difference between the
skin of the face and the layer which is infolded to form the
covering of the lips and the lining membrane of the mouth.
No tissue is more familiar to the student of physiology than
epithelium, composed, as it is, of epithelial cells or microscopic
elements, which in one form or another are found in almost
every important tissue of the body. The epithelium is a
delicate tissue, as usually seen in man and vertebrate animals ;
but in some instances it becomes hardened by the development
of horny matter, and may then appear as a tissue of tolerably
solid consistence. In the mouth of a cow or sheep, the epi-
thelium of part of the upper jaw is found hardened and callous,
and there forms a horny pad against which the front teeth of
the lower jaw may bite in the act of mastication. It is exactly
this epithelial layer, then, which becomes enormously developed
in the whalebone whales to form the baleen-plates just de-
scribed. That this is actually the case is ascertained by the
development of the baleen-plates, as well as by their situation
and relations to the gum and palate. And the recital becomes
the more astonishing when we consider that from cells of micro-
scopic size in other animals, structures of enormous extent may
126 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
be developed in the whales. The baleen-plates possess a highly
important office. They constitute a kind of huge strainer or
sieve, the possession of which enables the whale to obtain its
food in a convenient fashion. "Whether or not biblical scholars
and commentators agree in regarding the " great fish " which
wrought calamity to the Prophet Jonah as a special creation,
and as an entirely different animal from the whale of to-day,
the plain fact remains that a whale has a gullet of relatively
small size when compared with the bulk of the animal. Fortu-
nately, however, the faith of rational mankind is not pinned to
literal interpretation of the untoward incident chronicled in
Jonah ; and, whale or no whale, it is curious to learn that the
largest of animals may in a manner be said to feed on some of
the most diminutive of its fellows. In the far north, and in the
surface-waters of the Arctic seas, myriads of minute organisms,
closely allied to our whelks, and like molluscs, are found. Such
are the " sea-butterflies," or Pteropoda of the naturalist ; little
delicate creatures which paddle their way through the yielding
waters by aid of the wing-like appendages springing from the
sides of the head and neck. These organisms are drawn into
the mouth of the Greenland whale in veritable shoals, and as
the literal flood of waters streams out at the sides of the mouth,
the "sea-butterflies" are strained off therefrom, the savoury
morsels being retained by the fringed edges of the baleen-plates,
and thereafter duly swallowed as food.
An interesting speculation yet remains, however, regarding
the origin and first development of these peculiar whalebone
structures. Advocates of the doctrine which assumes that
animal forms and their belongings arise by gradual modifica-
tions of pre-existent animals, may be reasonably asked to
explain the origin of the baleen-plates of the whales. Let us
briefly hear what Mr. Darwin, as the spokesman of the party,
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 127
has to say in reply to such an inquiry. Quoting a remark ot
an opponent regarding the whalebone, Mr. Darwin says, if the
baleen " ' had once attained such a size and development as to
be at all useful, then its preservation and augmentation within
serviceable limits would be promoted by selection alone. But
how to obtain the beginning of such useful development ? ' In
answer," continues Mr. Darwin (in his own words), " it may be
asked, why should not the early progenitors of the whales with
baleen have possessed a mouth constructed something like the
lamellated beak of a duck. Ducks, like whales, subsist by
sifting the mud and water ; and the family (of ducks) has some-
times been called Criblatores, or sifters." Mr. Darwin's reference
to the duck's bill is peculiarly happy. The edges of the beak
in these birds are fringed with a beautiful series of horny plates
named lamellae, which serve as a straining apparatus as the
birds grope for their food amidst the mud of ponds and rivers.
These plates are richly supplied with nervous filaments, and,
doubtless, also some as organs of touch. Mr. Darwin is careful
to add that he hopes he may not " be misconstrued into saying
that the progenitors of whales did actually possess mouths
lamellated like the beak of a duck. I only wish to show," he
continues, " that this is not incredible, and that the immense
plates of baleen in the Greenland whale might have been de-
veloped from such lamella? by finely graduated steps, each of
service to its possessor"
In these last words, which we have italicised, lies the strength
of Mr. Darwin's hypothesis. Nature will preserve and develop
useful structures alone, and will leave the useless and unneeded
to perish and decay. This, indeed, is the keynote of Natural
Selection. Mr. Darwin next proceeds to examine in detail the
plates and lamellae in the bill of a shoveller duck. He describes
the horny plates, 1S8 in number, which " arise from the palate,
128 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
and are attached by a flexible membrane to the sides of the
mandible." He further notes that these plates " in several
respects resemble the plates of baleen in the mouth of a whale."
If the head of a shoveller duck were made as long as the head
of a species of whale in which the baleen-plates are only nine
inches long, the duck's lamella", would be six inches in length.
The head of the shoveller is about one-eighteenth of the length
of the head of such a whale, so that the difference in size
between the duck's lamella? and the imperfect baleen-plates of
this whale is not markedly disproportionate after all. After the
examination of the beaks of various species of swimming-birds,
Mr. Darwin arrives at the conclusion that " a member of the
duck family with a beak constructed like that of the common
goose, and adapted solely for grazing, or even a member with a
beak having less well-developed lamella?, might be converted by
small changes into a species like the Egyptian goose (which
partly grazes and partly sifts mud) this into one like
the common duck, and lastly, into one like the shoveller,
provided with a beak almost exclusively adapted for sifting
the water; for this bird could hardly use any part of its
beak, except the hooked tip for seizing or tearing solid food.
The beak of a goose, as I may add," says Mr. Darwin, "might
also be converted by small changes into one provided with pro-
minent recurved teeth, like those of the Merganser (a member
of the same family), serving for the widely different purpose of
securing live fish."
Mr. Darwin next endeavours to apply the moral of this
interesting sketch of probable modification of the bills of ducks
to the case of the whales. If the stages of modification in
these animals are hypothetically so clear, may not the case
of the whalebone-bearing whales be susceptible of like explana-
tion ? A certain whale (ffyperoddo*) belonging to a small
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 129
group known popularly as the " beaked whales," from the pos-
session of a prominent beak or snout, has no true teeth, but
bears rough, unequal knobs of horny nature in its palate. Here,
therefore, is a beginning for the work of selection and develop-
ment. Granted that these horny processes were useful to the
animal in the prehension and tearing of food, then their subse-
quent development into more efficient organs is a warrantable
inference if the order of living nature teaches us aright.
From rudimentary knobs, a further stage of development would
lead to an increase in which they may have attained the size
of the lamellce of an Egyptian goose, which, as already re-
marked, are adapted both for sifting mud and for seizing food.
A stage beyond, and we reach the shoveller's condition ("in
which the lamella? would be two-thirds of the length of the
plates of baleen "), in a species of whalebone whale (Balcenoptera)
possessing a slight 'development of these organs. And from
this point, the further gradations leading onwards to the
enormous developments seen in the Greenland whale itself, are
easily enough traced. Hypothetically, therefore, the path of
development is clear enough. Even if it be remarked that the
matter is entirely one of theory, not likely to be ever partly
verified, far less proved at all, we may retort that any other
explanation of the development of the organs of living beings,
and of living beings themselves, must also be theoretical in its
nature and as insusceptible of direct proof as are Mr. Darwin's
ideas. But the thoughtful mind must select a side, and choose
between probabilities; and it is not too much to say that
towards the side of the idea which advocates gradual modifica-
tion and selection as the rule of life and nature, every unbiassed
student of natural science will by sheer force of circumstances
be led to turn.
The whalebone whales have no teeth, although the sperm
130 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS,
whale possesses teeth in the lower jaw ; but thereby that is,
as regards the teeth of whales at large hangs a tale of some
importance, and to which our attention may be briefly directed.
Amongst the paradoxes of living nature, no circumstances
present more curious features than those relating to the so-
called " rudimentary organs " of animals and plants. Now, the
whales furnish several notable examples of the anomalies
which apparently beset the pathways of development in
animals. The adult whalebone whale is toothless, as has
just been remarked; and this fact becomes more than
usually interesting when taken in connection with another,
namely, that the young whale before birth possesses teeth,
which are shed or absorbed, and in consequence disappear
before it is born. These teeth never " cut the gum," and the
upper jaw of the sperm whale presents us with a like phe-
nomenon for consideration. Nor are the* whales peculiar in
this respect. The upper jaw of ruminant animals has no front
teeth as may be seen by looking at the mouth of a cow or
sheep, yet the calf may possess rudimentary teeth in this
situation, these teeth also disappearing before birth. Now,
what meaning, it may be asked, are we to attach to such phases
of development ? Will any considerations regarding the
necessity for preserving the " symmetry," or " type," of the
animal form aid us here? or will the old and over-strained
argument from design enable us to comprehend why nature
should provide a whale or a calf with teeth for which there is
no conceivable use? The only satisfying explanation which
may be given of such anomalies may be couched in Darwin's
own words. The embryonic teeth of the whales have a reference
" to a former state of things." They have been retained by the
power of inheritance. They are the ignoble remnants and
descendants of teeth which once were powerful enough, and of
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 131
organs with which the mighty tenants of the seas and oceans
of the past may have waged war on their neighbours. Again,
the laws and ideas of development stand out in bold relief as
supplying the key to the enigma. Adopt the theory that
" things are now just as they always were," and what can we
say of rudimentary teeth, save that Nature is a blunderer at
best, and that she exhibits a lavish waste of power in supplying
animals with useless structures ? But choose the hypothesis of
development, and we may see in the embryo-teeth the repre-
sentatives of teeth which in the ancestors of our whales served
all the purposes of such organs. Admit that through disuse
they have become abortive and useless ; and we may then, with
some degree of satisfaction, explain their true nature. To use
Darwin's simile, such rudiments are like letters in a word (e.g.,
" debt " and " alms ") which have become obsolete in pronun-
ciation, but which are retained in the spelling, and serve as a
clue to the derivation of the word.
In the course of these remarks allusion has been made to
more than one species of whale, and it may therefore form a
study of some interest if we endeavour shortly to gain an idea
of the general relationship and degrees of affinity of the various
members of this curious family-circle. The whale order in-
cludes several of the divisions to which the zoologist applies
the name of " families," indicating by this latter term a close
affinity in form, structure, and habits between the members of
each group. First in importance amongst these families comes
that of the whalebone whales (Balcenidce). Here we find
family characters in a head disproportionately large when com-
pared with the body as a whole, whilst the muzzle is sloping,
and of rounded conformation. Teeth are absent, as we have
seen ; whalebone-plates fringe the palate ; and the " blowhole "
is single, and exists on the top of the head. Such are the
132 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
family characters in which the Greenland or right whale, and
the still larger rorqual participate, along with the "finner"
whales and "humpbacked" whales. There is no back fin in
the Greenland whale, but the rorquals and their neighbours
possess this appendage. It need hardly be said that, com-
mercially, the former animal is of most importance ; whilst the
rorquals are famed as the largest of the whales. Specimens of
the rorqual have been captured exceeding 100 feet in length.
One specimen, measuring 95 feet in length, weighed 245 tons.
Next in importance to the Greenland whale and its relatives
may be mentioned the family (Physeteridce), of which the
sperm whale is the representative form. Here, the head reaches
literally enormous proportions, and may make up fully one-third
of the body. A blunt, square muzzle; a lower jaw armed
with teeth ; an absence of baleen-plates, and a front blowhole
such are the characters of the sperm whale, which gives
sperm oil to the merchant, and spermaceti and ambergris
to the man of drugs. A whole host of /'small fry" present
themselves as near relations of the whales in the shape of the
dolphins, porpoises, grampus, " bottle-noses," , and other ani-
mals, including the famous narwhal, or sea-unicorn, possessing
the longest tooth in the world, in the shape of a spiral ivory pole
of some eight or ten feet in length. Here also the Beluga,
catodon, or " white whale," finds a zoological home, this latter
form being the species of which more than one specimen has
been recently exhibited in London. The beluga, being a
member of the dolphin family, is a " whale " by courtesy only.
Like the other members of this group, its blowhole is single
and crescentic in shape, and both jaws are well provided with
teeth. But the beluga, unlike the dolphins and porpoises, has
no back fin, and its muzzle is blunt. This animal, however,
is still certainly " very like a whale " in its general shape and
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 133
aspect. Its creamy white skin is certainly a peculiar feature ;
but the broad, horizontal tail-fin is well exemplified in this
northern stranger, whilst the breathing habits of its group may
also be studied superficially but satisfactorily on the specimen
in question. The beluga inhabits the North American coast,
at the mouths of the rivers on the Labrador and Hudson's Bay
coasts, whilst it is known to penetrate even to the Arctic regions.
These whales are plentiful in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in spring
and summer, and appear to migrate to the west coast of Green-
land in October and November. The Esquimaux regard the
beluga as their special prize, and contrive, with the aptitude
for design which the necessities of savage existence teach, to
utilise well-nigh every portion of its frame, even to the manu-
facture of a kind of animal-glass from its dried and transparent
internal membranes.
But little space remains in which to treat of certain near
relations and somewhat interesting allies of the whales. Such
are the Manatees, or " sea-cows," and the dugongs, collectively
named Sirenia, in the category of zoologists. The origin of
this latter name is attended with some degree of interest. It
has been bestowed on these animals from their habit of
assuming an upright or semi-erect posture in the water ; their
appearance in this position, and especially when viewed from a
distance by the imaginative nautical mind, having doubtless
laid a foundation, in fact, for the tales of " sirens " and " mer-
maids " anxious to lure sailors to destruction by their amatory
numbers. Any one who has watched the countenance of a seal
from a short distance must have been struck with the close
resemblance to the human face which the countenance of these
animals presents. Such a likeness is seen even to a greater
degree in the sea-cows, which also possess the habit of folding
their " flippers," or swimming paddles, across their chests, and,
134 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
it is said, of holding the young to the breast in the act of
nutrition by aid of the paddle-like fore limbs. If I mistake
not, Captain Sowerby mentions, in an account of his voyages,
that the surgeon of the ship on one occasion came to him in a
state of excitement to announce that he had seen a man swim-
ming in the water close at hand ; the supposed human being
proving to be a manatee, which had been, doubtless, merely
exercising a natural curiosity regarding the ship and its tenants.
These animals are near relatives of the whales, but differ from
them, not merely in habits, but in bodily structure and con-
formation. They live an estuarine existence, rarely venturing
out to sea. The manatees occur in the shallow waters and at
the mouths of the great rivers of the Atlantic coasts of America
and Africa. The dugongs inhabit the shores of the Indian
Ocean, and are common on certain parts of the Australian
coasts. There are only two living genera the manatees and
dugongs of these animals; a third, the Rhytina, SteUeri,
having, like the famous dodo, become extinct through its
wholesale slaughter by man in 1768 just twenty-seven years
after it was first discovered by the voyager Behring on a small
island lying off the Kamtschatkan coast. The rhytina was
a great unwieldy animal of some twenty-seven feet in length,
and about twenty feet in circumference. It fell a ready prey
to Behring and his crew, who were located on the island for
several months, the work of extermination being duly com-
pleted by subsequent voyagers who visited the island. The
manatees are no strangers to London, since in 1875 one of these
animals was to be seen disporting itself in the seal-tank in the
gardens of the Zoological Society at Regent's Park. This spe-
cimen a female of immature age was brought from the
Demerara coast, and was the first living specimen which had
been brought to England, although attempts had been made
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 135
in 1866 to procure these animals for the gardens at Kegent's
Park, one specimen, indeed, dying just before reaching South-
ampton. A member of the manatee group, obtained from
Trinidad, was recently exhibited in London, and the public,
interested in the curious in zoology were thus enabled to inter-
view a living member of the siren group whilst comparative
anatomists, in their turn, have been afforded a rich treat from
the fate which awaits rare and common specimens alike, having
overtaken the illustrious visitor in question.
The manatees and dugongs possess bodies which, as regards
their shape, may be described each as a great barrel "long
drawn out." No hinder limbs are developed, this latter
peculiarity distinguishing them from the seals, and relating
them to the whales. The hide is very tough, sparsely covered
\vith hair, and most nearly resembles that of the hippopotamus.
The " nippers," or paddle-like limbs, are placed far forward on
the body, and on the edge of the paddle rudimentary nails are
developed ; whilst concealed beneath the skin of the paddle we
find the complete skeleton of an arm or fore-limb. The tail is
broad, horizontally flattened, like that of the whales, and forms
an effective propeller. These animals are vegetable feeders, the
Zoological Society's specimen having exhibited a strong partiality
for lettuce and vegetable-marrow. In a state of nature, the sea-
cows crop the marine vegetation which fringes their native
shores. The remaining outward features of interest in these
creatures may be summed up by saying that no back fins are
developed ; that the eyes are very small and inconspicuous ;
and that although the anterior nostrils are never used as "blow-
holes," they can be closed at will like the nostrils of the seals
a faculty of needful kind in aquatic animals. To the technical
anatomist, the sea-cows present strong points of resemblance to
some of the hoofed quadrupeds. The anatomical examination
136 WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS.
of these animals has shown that their peculiarities are not
limited to their outward appearance and habits. It is not
generally known, for example, that the neck of the vast
majority of mammals consists of seven vertebra or segments of
the spine. Man thus possesses this number in common with
the giraffe, the elongation of whose neck is produced not by
introduction of new vertebra, but by the great development of
the normal number, seven. The manatees, however, present a
very remarkable exception to this most general of rules, in that
they possess only six vertebras in their necks. The only other
exceptions to the rule of seven as the normal number of neck-
vertebras in quadrupeds, are found in one species of sloth which
has six vertebra like the manatee, and in another kind of sloth
which possesses nine. Then, also, the dugongs possess a heart
of very curious conformation, its apex or tip being widely cleft
or divided a feature much more plainly marked in these
animals than in the elephants and seals, whose hearts, anatomic-
ally speaking, are also divided. The manatees possess well-
developed molars or grinding teeth, but have no front teeth in
the adult state. Like the whalebone whale, however, the youug
manatee has front teeth, these, again, disappearing before birth,
and presenting us once more with examples of rudimentary
organs which possess a reference " to a former state of things."
What evidence is at hand respecting the remote ancestors of
the whales and their neighbours ? is a question which may form
a fitting conclusion to these brief details of the family history
of the group. The geological evidence shows us that the whales
are comparatively " recent " forms, speaking geologically, and
dealing notwithstanding the word " recent " with very re-
mote and immense periods of time. Amongst the oldest fossil
whales we find one form in particular (Zeuglodon) which had
teeth of larger kind than are possessed by any living whale,
WHALES AND THEIR NEIGHBOURS. 137
this creature being by some authorities regarded as linking the
whales with the seals. The fossil remains of zeuglodon and its
neighbours first occur in Eocene rocks that is, in the oldest
formations of the Tertiary series, and in rocks of relatively
" recent " nature. These remarkable creatures were as gigantic
as their living representatives. One species is known to have
attained a length of seventy feet. Their remains are of such
frequent occurrence in the " Jackson Beds " of the United States,
that Professor Dana remarks, " The large vertebra, some of
them a foot and a half long and a foot in diameter, were formerly
so abundant over the country in Alabama, that they were used
for making walls, or were burned to rid the fields of them."
The teeth of this curious monster of the vasty Eocene deep
were of two kinds, and included front teeth of conical shape, and
grinders or molars ; the latter exhibiting a striking peculiarity
in that they were formed each of two halves, or teeth united by
their crowns, but separated at their roots. Zeuglodon, as already
noted, appears to connect the whales and their neighbours with
the seals and walruses, and thus in one sense may be said to
constitute, if not a " missing link," at least an intermediate form
of anomalous kind, when viewed relatively to the existing
cetaceans. According to the geological evidence at hand, we
may assume that the modifications which have produced the
existing whales and their neighbours are of comparatively recent
date, and that their adaptation to an aquatic life is a thing but
of yesterday, when pompared with the duration of previous a?ons
in the history of our globe.
FOOD AND FASTING.
THE recent experiment of Dr. Tanner, in proving the possibility
of sustaining life during a long fast upon air and water alone,
affords a text whereon some interesting particulars concerning
food and starvation at large may be hung. Apart from their
notoriety, such experiments can hare little interest. They can
certainly never overthrow established physiological ideas regard-
ing the necessity not merely for solid food, but for that due and
natural mixture of food-principles which we can easily show
Nature insists upon our receiving day by day. Unless we could
rationally indulge in the wild supposition that man's constitution
is susceptible of fundamental alteration and sweeping change,
the idea of living for any length of time on water and air alone
must be viewed as a dream, worse by many degrees than
Utopian. These may be strongly expressed opinions, but they
can be more than justified by the most elementary study in
physiology.
Why do we require to take food ? or, in plainer terms, why
do we eat our dinner? are questions demanding no great exercise
of knowledge for their clear solution. It constitutes a great fact
of Nature that every action we perform entails a corresponding
amount of waste on our physical frame. Work means waste,
equally to a human body and a locomotive engine. "More
FOOD AND FASTING. 139
work, more waste," is a motto alike true of the mechanic's
apparatus and of the mechanic himself. Not an action, we
repeat, is performed by us which is not accompanied by an
expenditure of force derived from and accompanied by a pro-
portional waste of substance. The movements of muscles, the
beating of the heart, the winking of an eyelid, the thinking a
thought, entail wear and tear upon the muscles that work and
upon the brain-cells that think. Every action necessitates bodily
waste and corresponding physical repair. Waste, however,
cannot of necessity be a single and final process in a living body
unless, indeed, we were born with a full complement of matter,
and were permitted in the order of Nature to live on the prin-
cipal with which we had been provided, instead of wisely using
that principal as a means of gaining a livelihood through the
interest it acquired. That we are not so constituted, is an
evident fact ; hence our bodies demand pretty constant repair
as a companion action to that of work, labour, and duty. This
process of repair consists in the reception of matter from the
outer world, in the transformation of this matter into ourselves,
and in its utilisation in the work and repair of the frame.
Such matter we shortly name food, and the processes whereby
it is converted into our own bodily substance we term digestion.
One of the plainest rules for taking food is that which insists
that we must find in our nourishment the substances of which
the body itself is composed. If we think of it, such a rule is in
strict conformity with the dictates of common sense. We are
bound to obtain from our food the matter the body lacks ; and
any food, however pleasant to the palate, but which does not
contain elements naturally found in the frame, may be unhesi-
tatingly rejected from the lists of our dietaries-. It follows,
therefore, that to know what foods are required for our suste-
nance, we must investigate the chemical composition of our
140 FOOD AND FASTING.
frame. In this way we discover, for instance, that we are
largely composed of water. Two-thirds of a human body by
weight are composed of water. A body weighing one hundred
and sixty-five pounds, will include in its belongings one hundred
and ten pounds of water. Water further permeates or enters
into the composition of every tissue ; hence the reason why
thirst is so much more painful than hunger, and that whilst the
latter is a comparatively local condition, the former affects the
entire frame. And we also thus see the importance of water as an
article of diet a phase in which we are not usually accustomed
to regard it. If we take even the most cursory survey of our
bodily composition, we find that our chemical structure is of
the most motley and varied description. Thus we shall find a
large selection of minerals in our tissues ; lime, magnesia, etc.,
in our bones ; common salt in our stomachs and elsewhere ; iron
in our blood ; and phosphorus in brain and nerve. Then coming
to our soft parts, we find that these may be divided into what
physiologists call the nitrogenous and non-nitrogenous com-
pounds. Of these, the former contain the element nitrogen in
addition to other elements, whilst the latter want this element.
Thus the "albuminous" or white-of-egg-like substances existing
in our frames, contain nitrogen; whilst the fats of the body,
and the sugars and starches, do not. To these latter, we
may add water and minerals, as also non-nitrogenous in their
nature.
Now in such a simple study of what we are made of, we
have already made some important discoveries as to the kinds
of food on which we are intended to subsist. If these matters
compose our frames, and if further the substances just enumer-
ated waste and wear and disappear in the work of life, it must
follow that we shall require to find new matters of like kind in
our food. And it is in accordance with such plain information
FOOD AND FASTING. 141
afforded by chemistry, that we find physiologists dividing foods
into two classes the "nitrogenous" and "non-nitrogenous"
groups just alluded to. When, for example, we eat a piece of
beef, we are receiving "nitrogenous " food in its juice and in its
fibres ; and we are also obtaining the other variety of foods
from its water, its fats, and its mineral matters which are not
nitrogenous in their composition. If we eat an egg, we are
presented with a more perfect compound and union of the two
classes of foods; for in an egg, water, fats, and minerals are
present, in addition to the white and other parts which consist
largely of albumen or nitrogenous matter. It is perfectly clear,
therefore, that for health we require a mixture of the two kinds
of foods just mentioned. We cannot live either on a diet solely
nitrogenous, or solely lacking nitrogen. And this great truth
as to foods can be proved very directly by an appeal to Nature
herself. On what food, let us ask, does Nature intend and
cause us to subsist during the earliest or infantile period of life,
when bones, muscles, sinews, nerve, and brain are all growing
rapidly, and laying the foundations of their future ? The reply
bears that milk is the fluid-food upon which Nature relies for
the perfect support of man in his early life. Hence it is but
proper to acquire a knowledge of the component parts of milk.
In one thousand parts of cow's milk, for example, there are
eight hundred and fifty-eight parts of water and one hundred
and forty-two parts of solids. Here, again, we find a proof of
the importance of water, even in Nature's typical food. The
solids of cow's milk are distributed as follows : of casein there
are sixty-eight parts, this substance representing the nitrogenous
element in milk ; of butter or fat there are thirty-eight parts ;
of sugar thirty parts ; and of mineral matters six parts. Thus
milk, then, is purely and simply a mixture of nitrogenous and
non-nitrogenous foods. Nature teaches us through the com-
142 FOOD AND FASTING.
position of her own fluid food, that on both classes of nutriment
we must rely for support ; and experiment shows us that one
kind of food alone, however nutrient it may be, will not nourish
the body or maintain it in a normal state. In an egg, too, we
find much the same composition. From this body which forms
the young animal and which affords all the nourishment
necessary for growth, we obtain a combination of the nitrogen-
bearing substances with the non-nitrogenous, such as milk
itself contains. We are not at present concerned with discus-
sing the merits of a vegetable or a mixed dietary. From plants
alone, or from animal matter alone for that matter, both kinds
of foods can be obtained. All that is required in any dietary
is to insure that a due mixture of nitrogenous and non-nitro-
genous parts should enter ; and we obtain such a mixture more
readily from a mixed, that is, an animal and plant diet
combined, than from a purely vegetable or a purely animal
dietary alone.
Bearing these facts in mind, the folly of attempting to
sustain life, without having recourse to those substances which
can give heat and restore waste, is plainly apparent. Water
and air alone, cannot support life adequately. The water will,
of course, enter into combination with the tissues, and will in
that sense prove itself a necessary condition for normal and
healthy existence. The oxygen of the air entering the blood
in the lungs into which it has been breathed, will give heat,
but only through entering into chemical union with the carbon
found in the body, and most notably in the fats. Hence mere
atmospheric air itself is relatively useless, unless we can supply
it with substances with which it can combine ; and these
substances it need hardly be said are daily renewed from the
solid foods we eat.
So much for the foods we require. It may interest our
FOOD AND FASTING. 143
readers to learn that even plants require something more than
air and water to support them. True, a plant is a more wonder-
ful organism than an animal in one sense, because it can live
upon inorganic or lifeless matter, and also because it has the
power of converting that matter into a living plant. Plants
live upon water, minerals, ammonia, and carbonic acid the
latter being the gas which is exhaled from the breathing organs
of animals. From these matters, the life-forces build up the
living plant. On the other hand, an animal demands living
matter for its support. It could not live on the water, carbonic
acid, and other matters with which the plant is perfectly
contented. And we accordingly find animals requiring the
matter of other animals or plants for their food. There are
some plants such as the fungi and lower plants at large
which resemble animals in that they demand living matter for
their support. A mushroom, for instance, can only thrive
where there is decaying living or organic matter. It likewise
breathes oxygen as if it were an animal, and utterly rejects the
carbonic acid gas which the green leaves of its plant-neighbours
are greedily drinking in. So that the boundary lines between
plants and animals are but faintly drawn in the matter of foods ;
and we also learn that even the plants which we are accustomed
to regard as lower than animals in their feeding and dietary,
may in reality approach very near to the animal world in the
essential characters of their nutrition.
"When the human body suffers from a lack of food, it practi-
cally feeds upon itself and absorbs its own substance as food.
Every one knows that certain animals normally exhibit this
process of feeding upon themselves under certain conditions. The
humps of the camel or those of the Indian cattle visibly decrease
and may disappear altogether, if the animals are starved. A
superfluous store of fat, in other words, is made use of under the
144 FOOD AND FASTING.
exigency of hunger. So is it also with the bears and other
animals which hibernate or sleep through the winter's cold.
The bear, which in autumn retires to winter-quarters in a well-
favoured condition, comes forth in spring lean and meagre. His
fats have been absorbed in his nutrition, and the succeeding
summer will lay the foundation of new stores of stable food to
be utilised during the next winter. With man, we repeat, the
phenomena of starvation are essentially similar. In the starving
man, the fats of the body are the first substances to disappear.
The fats lose weight to the extent of ninety-three per cent. ; next
in order the blood suffers; then the internal organs, such as
liver and spleen, suffer ; the muscles, bones, and nervous system
being the last to lose weight. In due time, also, the heat of the
body decreases to such an extent that ultimately death in a case
of starvation is really a case of death from loss of heat. When
the temperature falls to about thirty degrees Fahrenheit, death
ensues. This decrease arises from want of bodily fuel or food ;
but the immediate cause of the fatal ending of such a case is
decrease of temperature. It is likewise a curious fact that the
application of external warmth is even more effectual in reviving
animals dying of starvation than a supply of food. In exhaust-
ing diseases in man, in which the phenomena are strikingly
alike, and indeed thoroughly analogous to those of starvation,
the same facts are observed.
A highly interesting and important observation in reference
to starvation is, that life may be prolonged well-nigh indefinitely
by fluid nourishment alone, and for long periods simply on water.
Life will continue surprisingly long if water be within reach ;
but, as a rule, it terminates in from six to ten days with a total
deprivation of food and water together ; though much depends
upon the state of health, condition, and weight of body. As can
readily be understood, the stout will last longer than the lean,
FOOD AND FASTING. 145
and the healthy and strong will possess a plain advantage in
starvation over the diseased or weak.
Many interesting cases are on record, in which the phenomena
of starvation have been practically even if painfully illustrated.
As illustrating the fact of the prolongation of life when small
quantities of water have been at hand, we may cite a case quoted
by Fodere, who mentions that some workmen who had been
accidentally buried in a damp vault by the fall of a ruin, were
extricated alive after fourteen days' entombment. The dampness
of the atmosphere doubtless materially aided their preservation
through retarding the exhalation from the skin. It is on the
same grounds that shipwrecked sailors assuage the pangs of
thirst by soaking their clothes in sea-water. It was formerly
believed that the water was inhaled by the skin. It is not any
longer matter of doubt, however, that the skin is but a poor
absorptive medium, and that therefore the wet clothes of the
sailors merely act through lessening the skin-evaporation which
in its turn causes thirst.
Cases of extreme prolongation of life under a dietary consist-
ing of fluid alone are familiar to every physician. In exhausting
diseases, life may be sustained, as already noted, on small
quantities of fluid nourishment for lengthened periods of time.
Dr. Willan records a case in which a gentleman, the subject of
religious melancholia, and who abstained from solid food, lived
for sixty days on a little orange juice. Dr. Carpenter quotes a
case in which a young French lady who was insane, ate nothing
during a period of fifteen days ; whilst in hysterical states, as
Carpenter remarks, "there is frequently a very remarkable dis-
position for abstinence and power of sustaining it. In a case of
this kind," continues Dr. Carpenter, " a young lady who had just
before suffered severely from the tetanic form of hysteria, was
unable to take food for three weeks. The slightest attempt to
146 FOOD AND FASTING,
introduce a morsel of solid matter into the stomach occasioned
violent efforts at vomiting; and the only nourishment taken
during the period mentioned was a cup of tea once or twice
a day."
By way of showing how much depends on the weight of
body prior to starvation, we may hy way of conclusion mention
the case of a fat pig weighing one hundred and sixty pounds,
and which, by the fall of a Dover chalk cliff, was buried beneath
a mass of debris for one hundred and sixty days. At the end
of that period it was dug out lean and meagre, and weighing
only forty pounds. Here the heat of the body had been pre-
served by the utilisation of the fat, and to this circumstance the
preservation of life must be chiefly attributed. A case equally
in point appeared some time ago in the newspapers. This was
an instance of a Syke terrier belonging to a gentleman in
Devonshire, which went a-missing about the time of its master's
departure on a series of visits. On his return home, after an
absence of one month and five days, he unlocked the library,
the doors and windows of which had been bolted and barred
during his absence. To his astonishment the missing dog crept
out into the light, a living skeleton, and totally blind. Being
well cared for, he quite recovered his health and sight. During
this period of cruel imprisonment he had neither food nor water,
and had not gnawed the books or obtained sustenance from any
source whatever, but had subsisted by the absorption of the
fatty parts of his own body.
To sum up our inquiries, we thus learn, firstly, that in the
healthy adult the requirements of Nature demand daily a due
supply of food, liquid and solid, equal in amount to the wear
and tear of the body. About eight and one-third pounds of
matter are thus on an average daily given off and daily received
by the healthy adult frame ; or about three thousand pounds of
FOOD AND FASTING. 147
matter are excreted and received in the year. Secondly, we
learn that the food must give to the body the substances of
which the body consists, and that mere air and water are in
nowise sufficient to sustain life beyond a varying period of days.
Whilst, lastly, we may form the opinion that experimentation on
foods to be of practical value should lie within the lines which
physiology has clearly enough marked out.
SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS.
MODERN science has made us aware that the old belief in appa-
ritions rested on nothing more than illusive fancies caused by
some kind of physical derangement of the person so affected.
It is important that young persons should be made thoroughly
aware of the fact, that there never was and never will be any
such fancy which is not capable of being explained upon natural
grounds. A person in weak health, though in perfect possession
of all his faculties, begins to be troubled by waking visions of
persons with whom he may be familiar, or who may have been
long dead, or who sometimes may appear as perfect strangers to
him. The spectres who flit before him, " come like shadows "
and " so depart." They represent, in the most perfect manner,
the reproductions of things that are or were utterly intangible
creations. The subject of these visitations may hear the spectres
converse, and they may even talk in turn to him. He is per-
fectly aware of their visionary nature, and is as convinced of
their unreality as is the friend who sees them not, and to whom
the phantoms are described. No suspicions of insane delusion
as to these visitations can be entertained for a moment, and the
question may therefore naturally be put to the man of science,
" How can these illusions be accounted for ? " The answer is
to be found in one of the simplest studies in the physiology of
SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS. 149
nerves and of mind, and shows us that these illusions have a
material basis, or that, in the words of the poet, the " shadow
proves the substance true."
To thoroughly elucidate the subject of illusions within a
brief space, we may begin by selecting one or two illustrations
of illusive vision, such as have been recorded for instruction
and edification in the pages of the physiologist. One of the
best known cases deriving its interest from the fact that the
subject of the visitations in question himself narrates the facts
is that of Nicolai, a well-known citizen and bookseller of
Berlin, who read an account of his case before .the Berlin
Academy of Sciences. We shall give the account in his own
words. " During the few latter months of the year 1790," says
Nicolai, "I had experienced several melancholy incidents,
which deeply affected me, particularly in September, from
which time I suffered an almost uninterrupted series of misfur-
tunes, that affected me with the most poignant grief. I was
accustomed to be bled twice a year, and this had been done
once on the 9th of July, but was omitted to be repeated at the
end of the year 1790. ... I had, in January and February of
the year 1791, the additional misfortune to experience several
extremely unpleasant circumstances, which were followed on
the 24th of February by a most violent altercation. My wife
and another person came into my apartment in the morning in
order to console me ; but I was too much agitated by a series
of incidents which had most powerfully affected my moral feel-
ing, to be capable of attending to them. On a sudden, I per-
ceived, at about the distance of ten steps, a form like that of a
deceased person. I pointed at it, asking my wife if she did not
see it. It was but natural that she should not see anything ;
my question therefore alarmed her very much, and she sent
immediately for a physician. The phantasm continued for
ISO SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS.
some minutes. I grew at length more calm, and being ex-
tremely exhausted, fell into a restless sleep, which lasted about
half an hour. The physician ascribed the vision to violent
mental emotion, and hoped there would be no return ; but the
violent agitation of my mind had in some way disordered my
nerves, and produced further consequences, which deserve a
more minute description.
" At four in the afternoon, the form which I had seen in
the morning reappeared. I was by myself when this happened,
and being rather uneasy at the incident, went to my wife's
apartment ; but there likewise I was persecuted by the form,
which, however, at intervals disappeared, and always presented
itself in a standing posture. About six o'clock there appeared
also several walking figures, which had no connection with the
first. After the first day, the form of the deceased person no
more appeared ; but its place was supplied with many other
phantasms, sometimes representing acquaintances, but mostly
strangers : those whom I knew were composed of living and
deceased persons, but the number of the latter was compara-
tively small. . . . When I shut my eyes these forms would
sometimes vanish entirely, though there were instances when I
beheld them with my eyes closed ; yet, when they disappeared
on such occasions, they generally returned when I opened my
eyes. . . . They all appeared to me in their natural size, and as
distinct as if alive, exhibiting different shades of carnation in
the uncovered parts, as well as different colours and fashions in
their dresses, though the colours seemed somewhat paler than
in real nature ; none of the figures appeared particularly terrible,
comical, or disgusting, most of them being of an indifferent
shape, and some presenting a pleasing aspect. The longer these
persons continued to visit me, the more frequently did they
return, while at the same time they increased in number about
SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS. 151
four weeks after they had first appeared. I also began to hear
them talk ; sometimes among themselves, but more frequently
they addressed their discourse to me ; their speeches being un-
commonly short and never of an unpleasant turn. At different
times there appeared to me both dear and sensible friends of
both sexes, whose addresses tended to appease my grief, which
had not yet wholly subsided ; their consolatory speeches were
in general addressed to me when I was alone. Sometimes,
however, I was accosted by these consoling friends while I was
engaged in company, and not unfrequently while real persons
were speaking to me. The consolatory addresses consisted
sometimes of abrupt phrases, and at other times they were
regularly executed."
Such was Nicolai's account of the phantom-visitors who
addressed and consoled him in his domestic affliction. It is
interesting to pursue still further his account of their disap-
pearance. The reader will recollect that Nicolai had neglected
to repeat at the end of 1790 the blood-letting in which it
was customary in the days we speak of for our forefathers
to indulge. It was at last decided that leeches should be
used, and on April 20, 1791, at eleven o'clock in the morning,
Nicolai informs us the operation was performed. " No person,"
he continues, " was with me besides the surgeon ; but during
the operation my chamber was crowded with human visions of
all descriptions. This continued uninterruptedly till about half
an hour after four o'clock, just when my digestion commenced.
I then perceived that they began to move more slowly. Soon
after, their colour began to fade, and at seven o'clock they were
entirely white. But they moved very little, though the forms
were as distinct as before ; growing, however, by degrees more
obscure, yet not fewer in number, as had generally been the
case. . . . They now seemed to dissolve in the air, while frag-
152 SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS.
ments of some of them continued visible for a considerable
time. About eight o'clock, the room was entirely cleared of
my fantastic visitors. Since that time," adds Nicolai, " I have
felt twice or three times a sensation as if they were going to
ivappear, without, however, actually seeing anything. The
same sensation surprised me just before I drew up this account,
while I was examining some papers relative to these phenomena,
which I had drawn up in the year 1791."
Such is an historical account of what may appear to the
senses of a sane and reasonable individual. Before entering on
their scientific explanation, it will be advisable to give one or
two further examples of the phenomena in question. On the
occasion of the fire which destroyed part of the Crystal Palace
in the winter of 1866-67, part of the menagerie had been sacri-
ficed to the flames. The chimpanzee, however, was believed to
have escaped from his cage, and was presently seen on the roof
endeavouring to save himself by clutching in wild despair one
of the iron beams which the fire had spared. The struggles of
the animal were watched with an intense curiosity mingled
with horror and sympathy for the supposed fate which awaited
the unfortunate monkey. What was the surprise of the spec-
tators of an imminent tragedy, to find that the object which in
the guise of a terrified ape, had excited their fears, resolved
itself into a piece of canvas blind, so tattered, that to the eye
of the imagination and when moved by the wind, it presented
the exact counterpart of a struggling animal !
Such an example is of especial interest, because it proves to
us that not one person alone, but a large number of spectators
may be deceived by an object imperfectly seen and aided, in
the illusion by a vivid imagination into fancying all the details
of a spectacle of which the chief actor is entirely a myth.
A singular case has been given on strict medical authority
SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS. 153
of a lady, who, walking from Penrhyn to Falmouth her mind
being occupied with the subject of drinking-fountains was
certain she saw in the road a newly erected fountain, bearing
the inscription, " If any man thirst, let him come unto me and
drink." As a matter of course she mentioned her interest in
seeing such an erection to the daughters of the gentleman who
was supposed to have placed the fountain in its position. They
assured her that no such fountain was in existence ; but con-
vinced of the reality of her senses on the ground that " seeing
is believing," she repaired to the spot where she had seen the
fountain, only to find, however, a few scattered stones in place
of the expected erection.
We may now turn to consider the scientific explanation of
such curious phenomena in human existence. The causes of
these illusions are not difficult to understand, since they in
reality depend upon a slight derangement of the powers whereby
we see and hear in an ordinary and normal method. To make
our meaning clear, let us briefly consider what takes place in
ordinary sensation, when we see or hear the objects and sounds
of every-day existence. The eye alighting on an object transfers
an impression of that object to the brain through the special
(optic) nerve of sight, which leads from the eye to the part of
the brain exercising the sense of sight. We in reality do not
see with the eye. That organ is merely an arrangement of
lenses adapted to receive, focus, and otherwise adjust rays of
light streaming from the objects we see. The function of the
eye is simply that of adjusting and correlating the conditions
necessary for the production of an impression. This impression
is carried in due course to a special part of the brain, where it
becomes transformed into a special sensation that of sight.
We thus truly see not with the eye, but with the brain, or
rather with that portion of the Irain ivhich lies in direct relation
154 SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS.
with the nerves of sight. The eye represents the lenses of the
photographer's camera ; but the brain corresponds to the sensi-
tive plate which receives the image of the sitter, and on which
all subsequent alterations of the image are effected. Of the
other senses, the same prominent feature may also be expressed
namely, that in the brain and not in the mere organ of sense
must be allocated the true seat of knowledge. The ear modifies
waves of sound ; but it is the brain which distinguishes, appre-
ciates, and acts upon the information conveyed by the organ of
hearing. The finger touches an object ; but the seat of know-
ledge does not exist at the extremity of the hand. The impres-
sion of touch is duly conveyed to the brain as before, there to
be analysed, commented upon, and, if necessary, acted upon as
well.
On the appreciation of the simple fact that the brain is the
true seat of the senses, rests the whole explanation of the ghosts
and apparitions which occasionally attend the footsteps and
meet the eyes of humanity. When we are conscious of looking
at a real object, a sensation of sight is formed in the brain, as
we have seen. Such a sensation we call an " objective " one,
because it is derived from a veritable object. So also, when we
hear a tune played by a person whom we see, or of whose
existence, even when unseen, we entertain no doubt, the sensa-
tion of sound is then called " objective." But there are
many familiar instances in which the power of the mind to
reproduce the sensations, sights, and sounds we have received, is
demonstrated. The day-dreamer can sometimes bring the
scenes in which he has once taken part so vividly before his
mental gaze, that his reverie may actually be broken by the
words which unconsciously flow from his lips as his imagination
starts into bodily action. Such a power of fancy and imagina-
tion is the beginning or faint imitation of a still more powerful
SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS. 155
means which we possess of bringing before ourselves the forms
and scenes which have once been objectively present with us.
In the dream, this power is illustrated typically enough. From
the background of consciousness, so to speak, we project for-
wards, in our sleep, the pictures which a busy brain is repro-
ducing, or it may be piecing together the odds and ends of
its fancy to form the ludicrous combinations we are familiar
with in the " land of Nod." And if we carry the idea of this
same power being exercised in our waking moments, to form
the ghosts of science, the explanation of the otherwise curious
and mysterious subject of illusive visions will be complete.
We know then, that the brain has the ordinary power of
forming images which maybe projected outwards in the form of
the fancies of every-day life. But these projected fancies may
grow into plain and apparent sensations or images under the
requisite conditions. When we hear a " ringing in the ears," we
know perfectly well that no objective sound exists, and scienti-
fically we say that the sensation of hearing in such a case is an
internal or subjective one. When we see flashes of light which
have no existence in the outside world on which we happen to
be gazing, we explain their occurrence in the same way. Now,
on such a basis, the ghosts of science are both raised and laid.
The images and phantoms of Nicolai, like the sparks or flashes
of light, are subjective sensations. They arise, in other words,
from some irritation of that part of the brain, which would have
received the impression of sight had the objects in question had
an actual existence. But the subject also involves a reference
to bodily condition and to memory itself. Primarily, it will be
found that illusive visions appear only when the health of the
subject of these visitations is in a weakly state. The derange-
ment of the health is the primary cause of these curious states.
It is, however, equally worthy of remark that many of the
156 SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS.
phantoms of Nicolai were persons whom he knew. Such
visions then may be supposed to simply represent the effects of
very recent images which had been received and stored in the
brain, and which were evolved by the exercise of unconscious
memory. Of the deceased persons whose images appeared to
him, the same remark may be made memory again reproducing,
by the subjective impressions of the brain, the forms of dead
friends. But what, it may be asked, of the strange visions
whom Nicolai did not recognise? The reply which science
offers, is that these also were images or conceptions of persons
whom Nicolai must have seen at some time, but whom he could
not remember; mysterious reproductions, by the brain, of
events that had been impressed thereon, but which had escaped
remembrance by ordinary memory. Even the characters whom
Nicolai may have simply heard described, could be thus pro-
duced, and could present apparently the images of persons with
whom he was not, as a matter of conscious memory, familiar.
The brain, in other words, registers and remembers more than
memory can evolve ; and it is reasonable to conceive that for-
gotten images of things or persons once seen formed the myste-
rious strangers of Nicolai's waking dreams.
It is noteworthy that only after a long period of visitation
from his fantastic friends, did Nicolai begin to hear them speak.
Thus, the sense of hearing had also come in time to lend its aid
in propagating the illusions; and the fact that the visions
addressed Nicolai concerning his own immediate affairs and his
personal griefs and sorrows, clearly shows the unconscious action
of a mind which was brooding over its own trials, and which
was evolving from within itself the comfort and consolation of
kindly friends. Last of all, that the material basis of these
visionary friends resided in the weakly body of their host, is
proved by their disappearance on the resumption of the cus-
SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS. 157
ternary blood-letting and the improvement of the health an
additional fact showing the relation of the healthy body to the
sound mind.
One of the most interesting cases of vision-seeing by a person
of culture and intelligence is that related in the Athenieum of
January 10, 1880, by the Eev. Dr. Jessopp, who, in Lord
Orford's library, when engaged in copying some literary notes,
saw a large white hand, and then, as he tells us, perceived " the
figure of a somewhat large man, with his back to the fire, bend-
ing slightly over the table, and apparently examining the pile
of books I had been at work upon." The figure was dressed in
some antique ecclesiastical garb. The figure vanished when
Dr. Jessopp made a movement with his arm, but reappeared,
and again vanished when the reverend narrator threw down a
book with which he had been engaged. Dr. Jessopp's recital
called forth considerable comment, and amongst others a letter
from the present writer, detailing the familiar theory based on
the principles of subjective sensations, treated of in the present
paper. After noticing the fashion in which subjective sensations
become projected forwards, the author says (Athenteum, January
17, 1880) : " The only point concerning which any dubiety
exists, concerns the exact origin of the specific images which
appear as the result of subjective sensory action. My own idea
is that almost invariably the projected image is that of a person
we have seen and read about. ... In Dr. Jessopp's case there is
one fact which seems to weigh materially in favour of the idea
that the vision which appeared to him in Lord Orford's library
was an unconscious reproduction of some mental image or figure
about which the Doctor may very likely have concerned himself
in the way of antiquarian study." It is most interesting to
observe that in the succeeding number of the Athenaeum,
Mr. Walter Eye writes: "Dr. A. Wilson's solution 'that the
158 SCIENTIFIC GHOSTS.
" spectre "... was an unconscious reproduction of some mental
image or figure about which Dr. Jessopp may very likely have
concerned himself in the way of antiquarian study,' seems the
right one, and I think I can identify] the ' ghost.' The eccle-
siastically dressed large man, with closely cut reddish-brown
hair, and shaved cheek, appears to me the Doctor's remembrance
of the portrait of Parsons, the Jesuit Father, whom he calls in
his ' One Generation of a Norfolk House,' ' the manager and
moving spirit ' of the Jesuit mission in England. ... Dr. Jessopp
when he thought he saw the figure, was alone in an old library,
belonging to a Walpole, and Father Parsons was the leader
of Henry Walpole, the hero of his just-cited book. Small
wonder, therefore, if the association of ideas made him think
of Parsons."
All such illusive visions are thus readily explained as the
creatures of an imagination which, through some brain-dis-
turbance, is enabled to project its visions forward, on the seats
of sense, as the " ringing " in our ears is produced by some
irritation of the hearing-centre of the brain. The known vision
is a reproduction of a present memory, and the unknown vision
is the reproduction of a forgotten figure which has nevertheless
been stored away in some nook or cranny of the memory-
chamber.
We may thus dispel the illusion by its free explanation ;
and science has no higher function or nobler use than when,
by its aid, a subject like the present is rescued from the domain
of the mysterious, and brought within the sphere of ordinary
knowledge.
THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC.
ABOUT twenty-five years ago, the attention of Canadian geolo-
gists was called to a curious mineral, or rather combination of
minerals, which was chiefly notable from the fact that layers of
a dark-green colour were found alternating with white or limy
layers in a fashion till then unnoticed by science. These speci-
mens were collected at Burgess in Ontario by a Dr. Wilson, who
forwarded them to Sir William Logan, the Director of the
Canadian Geological Survey, as examples of a new or rare
mineral. Analysed, in due course, the dark-green layers were
found to consist of a new form of the familiar mineral named
"serpentine;" the name "loganite" being given to the new
substance in honour of the eminent geologist just mentioned.
Some years after the first discovery, which seemed thus to
end with the naming of a new mineral, other specimens, present-
ing variations in their composition, were obtained by a Mr.
M'Mullin from the limestones of the Grand Calumet on the
Ottawa Kiver. In these latter specimens, ordinary serpentine
was the chief mineral represented. Of the age of those curious
products no doubt was entertained. They occurred in rocks
named Laurentian from their great development near the St.
160 THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC.
Lawrence ; these rocks forming the great water-shed which lies
betwixt the St. Lawrence valley on the one hand, and the
plateaux which stretch away to the north and to Hudson's Bay
on the other.
When the second find was made on the Ottawa Eiver, the
appearance of the minerals suggested to Sir William Logan that
possibly the structures might represent traces of once living
matter that, in other words, he might be dealing with no mere
collection of mineral particles, but with matter that had replaced
living structures, and that had preserved these structures more
or less completely as a " fossil." After various investigations
made by Dr. Sterry Hunt of Montreal, the matter was settled by
Dr. Dawson and Dr. Carpenter, who showed, by microscopic
examination, that the limy material represented the shell, whilst
the serpentine had replaced the living matter. Branching out
within the limy layers, minute tubes were discovered ; and thus,
whatever the nature of the fossil, it was proved that its limy
parts were to be regarded as the actual representatives of the
original shell or structure, and the serpentine or loganite as the
matter which had filled up the shell and replaced the living
matter in Nature's process of fossil-making. The opinion has
thus been formed that in these Canadian limestones we find not
merely a curious fossil, but actually the oldest known traces of
living things. Hence the objects we are considering have
received the not inappropriate name of the Eozoon Canadense
or, in plain English, the " Dawn of Life Animalcule " from
Canadian rocks.
In these latter features alone, the "Dawn of Life Animalcule"
or Eozoon, as we may term it for shortness merits our
interest. Popularly, it has been described as the " first created "
thing; but for such a title there is no justification whatever.
What the first created organism was we do not know, and in
THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC. 161
Eozoon's age is that it is older than any other known fossil. It
is the oldest recognised fossil the first preserved trace so far as
we at present know of life on the earth. Nor was the interest
attaching to the discovery of Eozoon limited to the popular
mind. When it is learned that prior to the investigation of the
dark-green and white layers, the Laurentian rocks were regarded
as simply representing a remote period of time in which no
living thing existed, it can readily be imagined that the dis-
covery of a fossil organism threw a new light upon the condition
of the earth in the days of its youth. These rocks are spoken
of by geologists as " metamorphosed " that is, their original
nature has been changed by forces acting upon them subsequent
to their formation as rocks. Whilst, before Eozoon had been
brought to light, the more sanguine of geologists had ventured
to think of the Laurentian age as not wholly lifeless and its seas
as having been tenanted by lower forms of life, there were others
who not merely regarded the discovery of fossils therein as an
utterly hopeless idea, but included these rocks under the name
" azoic," a term meaning " without life."
To understand fully, then, the revolution in scientific ideas
which the discovery of this singular fossil brought about, it is
necessary to think of the geological position of the rocks in
which it occurs. By way of rendering this latter subject clear,
let us select a well-known group of rocks, as a land of geological
landmark, and test the age and position of the Laurentian rocks
by a comparison with the familiar series. Such a well-known
series of rocks we find in the Old Ked Sandstone beds, which in
torn are overlaid, in their natural order of formation, by the Coal
or Carboniferous series. Most readers are aware that the Old
Eed Sandstone rocks belong to the oldest of the periods into
which, for geological purposes, we divide time past. They are
infinitely older rocks, for instance, than the familiar Chalk.
M
162 THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC.
As, therefore, the Old Red Sandstone is older than the Chalk,
and in its natural position in the earth's crust lies so much
lower, so the Laurentian rocks in their turn exceed the Old Red
Sandstone in point of age. They lie at the very base and root
of the rocks which contain fossils. The Laurentian formations
thus appear before us as the oldest of the stratified rocks, and
probably represent the solidified ocean-beds which held the
primitive waters that for many early ages surrounded and
covered the solid earth as it was then represented. But it must
be also noted that rocks of similar age, and of like or allied
mineral composition, occur in other regions of the world. Xear
ourselves, these rocks are found in the Isle of Skye, in the
Hebrides, and in Sutherland. In the Malvern Hills and in
South "Wales, the Laurentian rocks are represented ; the north
of Ireland possesses them ; and Bohemia and Bavaria recognise
them as part and parcel of their respective geological con-
stitutions.
Having thus described the home of the Eozoon, we may now
turn to consider the " Dawn of Life Animalcule " itself. And
first as to its structure. What does the microscope reveal con-
cerning the nature of the so-called " shell," the fossil remains of
which are presented to view in the limy layers which vary the
monotony of the serpentine of the Laurentian limestones ? If
we slice a portion of our Laurentian rocks to the degree of thin-
ness requisite for microscopic examination, we may soon discover
therein very plain evidence of the nature of the organism which
boasts to be the oldest known fossil. The limy layers are
arranged in tiers like the seats in a theatre, and enclose between
them a space which we may discern has been divided into
chambers once occupied by living matter, but now filled with
the green serpentine of the rock. Imagine a series of chambers
placed in a line, like a set of rooms en suite ; and further sup-
THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC. 163
pose that many such sets of chambers were placed tier upon tier,
and we may form a correct idea of the manner in which the parts
of Eozoon are arranged. But it may also be noted that each set
of chambers was not wholly shut off from the tier above and the
tier below. Definite passages which might accurately be com-
pared to the staircases connecting the flats of a house, appear to
have existed between one tier of chambers and another; and
even in the partition walls separating one tier from its neigh-
bours, delicate tubes are seen to branch out. The walls of the
chambers were apparently perforated by numerous minute holes,
the purport of this arrangement being apparent when a com-
parison is made between Eozoon and its nearest neighbours
amongst living beings.
Such are the appearances presented by a vertical section of the
" Dawn of Life Animalcule." Other methods of investigating
its nature have not been neglected by geologists ; and the
writer has had the pleasure and advantage of personally inspect-
ing specimens of this fossil, prepared in various ingenious ways
and by various methods under the direction of Dr. Carpenter of
London, one of the highest authorities on the Eozoon and its
nearest living allies to be presently mentioned. Thus we may
" decalcify " specimens or, in other words, remove the limy
layers by means of an acid, and leave the serpentine unaffected,
in the form of a solid cast of the interior of the shell, represent-
ing the living matter which once filled it, and which built up
the shell from the lime of the primitive ocean in which Eozoon
dwelt. Curiously enough, this process of removing the lime of
a shell and leaving the mineral matter which filled its interior,
is known to occur in Nature and around us to-day. Internal
casts of shells, the living matter of which has been replaced by
the green mineral named " glauconite," and whose limy substance
has been dissolved away, are familiar to geologists ; and it is
1 64 THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC.
noteworthy that some of the shell-casts thus preserved are
nearly related to Eozoon itself.
The next point for discussion concerns the nature of this
the oldest relic of life. Its identification is not a difficult matter,
since there exists only one typical group of animals possessed of
an outer limy skeleton perforated, as we have noted the shell of
Eozoon to be, with holes. The name " Foraminifera " is by no
means unfamiliar to ordinary readers who have interested them-
selves in the accounts of deep-sea dredging expeditions. But
even if the organisms in question be quite unknown, their nature
may be readily enough comprehended. Imagine a little speck
of living jelly the " protoplasm " of the naturalist to be
possessed of the power of taking lime from the water of the
ocean, and of building this lime up to form a " shell " for the
protection of its body. Let us further suppose that through
minute holes in this shell, the little living speck could protrude
its substance to form delicate filaments adapted for movement
and for the seizure of food, and we shall then have formed a plain
but strictly correct idea of a Foraminifer. The shell of our
animalcule, as thus figured, consists of but a single chamber.
Suppose further that it begins to throw out buds or processes of
its substance, and that the buds remain connected to the parent
shell, and develop in time into new chambers, each containing
its speck of living matter, and we may conceive of our little
animalcule duly increasing in various ways. It may bud in a,
spiral fashion, and thus produce a spiral shell ; or it may grow
into a straight rod-like structure; the form of the shell thus
depending on the direction and extent of the process of budding
by which new chambers are produced.
Such a description is paralleled by the actual life of the little
animalcules which exist in myriads in our existing seas, as in
the oceans of bygone days, and whose shells are forming a thick
THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC. 165
layer of limy matter in the bed of the present seas, as in the
past, when the Chalk rocks of to-day were thus being formed.
For the white cliffs of Dover simply represent the shell-debris of
these animalcules consolidated to form the well-known formation
in question. With these animalcules, then, we readily identify
the Eozoon of the Latirentian rocks, despite obvious differences
in size and manner of growth. But the differences between the
" Dawn of Life Animalcule " and its modern representatives, the
Foraminifera, are not incapable of being reconciled. An appeal
to certain odd and still living forms of these animalcules serves
to narrow the gulf between the Laurentian shell-former and its
existing relatives. Take as an example of such connecting links
the living Folytrema of the zoologist, a member of the Fora-
minifera ; but which differs from its neighbours in that it grows
in a branching form, and then conies to somewhat resemble a
coral. The many chambers of which this organism's shell con-
sists grow in an irregular fashion, and communicate as freely as
do the chambers in one tier of Eozoon. Nor must we neglect to
remark that in the shell-wall of Polytrema a curious set of tubes
is found, analogous to those we see in Eozoon, and which are
also represented in many other living species of Foraminifera.
Allied likewise to the " Dawn of Life Animalcule " is the living
Calcarina, which also grows in patches, as if imitating the
higher corals ; and a curious extinct coin-like shell, that of
the Nummulite, also deserves mention, in respect that the
structure of its shell-wall exhibits a close relationship to that
of the oldest fossil.
We may now briefly glance at the probable condition under
which the life of this " oldest fossil " was carried on. In such a
survey, we picture to ourselves the bed of the Laurentian ocean
occupied by vast colonies of the Eozoon-shells, containing as
do the living Foraminiferous shells the soft living substance,
1 66 THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC.
which radiated through the shell-apertures in the form of the
delicate threads and processes whereby food-particles were
seized and drawn into the organism. A low form of life this :
hovering, as it were, on the very twilight of existence, but still
exhibiting in its own fashion many of the acts which characterise
life of the highest grade. Year by year these colonies extended
their growth ; and as the colonies of one generation died off, to
be replaced by others, the shells of the defunct races would be
imbedded in the sea-deposits, there to become the fossils of the
future. We can also form some idea of the subsequent changes
to which these old Laurentian rocks were subjected as the ages
passed ; their structure being altered so that their original nature-
was disguised, and the Eozoon-remains becoming also largely
transformed in certain localities. Finally, we see the modern
disposition of this world's order wrought out as the ages passed ;
and in time we find the discovery of life-traces to connect us
once again with the days when the world was young.
Such is an outline sketch of the progress of events which
geological history is prepared to chronicle. It would be idle to
speculate on the probabilities of the Laurentian age having har-
boured other forms of life in addition to Eozoon. But it is only
fair to remark that recent research supports such a suggestion.
Of the soft-bodied organisms which may have existed in the
waters of these early ages, no traces could be preserved, any
more than the jelly-fishes and soft-animals of our own seas can
be regarded as destined to hand down their lineaments to the
future of the earth although, indeed, traces of fossil jelly-
fishes are not unknown to geologists. In this latter view, the
Laurentian ocean may possibly have been the scene of a great
life-development, which must, however, have been of the lowest
grades, represented typically enough by Eozoon itself.
The balance of evidence in favour of the truly animal nature
THE EARLIEST KNOWN LIFE-RELIC. 167
of Eozoon is thus very apparent. From every consideration of
its structure, from the resemblances it presents to existing
shell-animalcules, as well as from collateral proofs drawn from
mineralogy itself, there remains little doubt that Eozoon really
represents what its name implies the most ancient record of
life which, so far as we know, has been preserved in the rock-
formations of the globe.
SKATES AND RAYS.
"NOT by any means an inviting subject for even a popular
dissertation," may possibly be the verdict of more than one
reader upon the subject and title of the present paper. The
fishes in question are undeniably commonplace. Indeed, their
appearance may be regarded as by no means interesting in any
sense, and even to minds of a scientific bent the group may not
seem at first sight inviting by way of intellectual repast, as
their substance may be regarded but poor fare in an actual
sense. But in science, as in ordinary existence, appearances
frequently count for nothing. The phrase omne ignotum pro
magnifico, may be paralleled by the expression of our belief
that much of the truly " unknown " exists in the commonest
objects of the world around us, and that a wealth of informa-
tion awaits the search of every patient observer in even the
tracts of knowledge which are most beaten and most hardly
worn.
The skates and rays figure, of course, as important items in
our list of food-fishes albeit, as already mentioned, that their
flavour is somewhat peculiar, and apt soon to pall on the taste
of those accustomed to fresh fish of superior kind, such as the
tasteful haddock or whiting, or the still more delicious sole or
flounder, not to speak of more lordly fare. Zoologically regarded,
SKATES AND RAYS. 169
the skate or ray is a prince among the fish kind. From every
limb and feature of its economy, the professor of natural history
using the word in its modern sense, and not as indicating an
acquaintance with all the known as well as certain occult and
unknown '"ologies" may extract tomes of information not
merely concerning fish-life at large, but regarding other and
very varied groups of animals. Our scientific observer would
sorely miss the skates and rays, since they form cheap, accessible,
and handy " subjects " for zoological investigation notwith-
standing that the fish, at an advanced stage of such scientific
research, whilst becoming " small by degrees and beautifully
less," increases in an inverse ratio as regards olfactory prominence
of a kind the reverse of agreeable to unscientific bystanders.
Whoever has watched a skate or ray in an aquarium must
have been struck by the somewhat human expression assumed
by the front portion of the under surface of the body, which
portion, for want of a better term, we may call the face. By
the same rule that in the faces of dogs, cats, and horses we may
occasionally detect a most marked resemblance to some human
physiognomy, so it may be noted that in the skates and rays
there is a rough but discernible likeness to be seen to the human
countenance. In a lively mood the skate is quite a graceful
fish. He may be seen to swim elegantly enough by the wavy
movements of those great side or breast fins, which really form
a very large part of his broad back and body. For our fishes
rank amongst the few members of their class that are truly
" flat," in the sense of possessing a broad back. The flounders,
soles, turbot, and their allies, are flat, it is true, but their
flatness is that of the sides of the body and not of the back. A
sole or flounder swims and lies on one peculiarly modified side ;
its other and upper side bearing the eyes, which have thus come
to be transferred to one side of the body by the twisting
i;o SKATES AND KAYS.
of the bones of the head. This latter process takes place in
these fishes owing to an acquired habit of their ancestors in
resting and lying on one side shortly after leaving the egg, at
which period the eyes are normally placed, one on each side of
the body. This much, however, by way of showing that the
skate and ray are really flat-bodied. Their back is a great
broad surface, which, as already remarked, owes something of
its extent to the fact that the breast fins, instead of being free
and separate from the body, as in other fishes, are united to it,
and are thus incorporated into and add to its breadth.
Scattered here and there over the body of the skate or ray
we perceive numerous bony granules of small size. These are
the "scales" of the fish, and are of the variety named "placoid"
by the naturalist. Occasionally the rays may develop for-
midable spines in connection with their scales. The thornback
skate (Baia clavata) thus presents a perfect array of such spines
along the middle line of its back and tail. Each spine has a
broad base, and is of curved shape and pointed form. And the
thornback in a passion is no mean foe. Bending its body like
a bow, until the tip of the tail well-nigh touches its pointed
nose, this ray will suddenly lash out the tail with great force,
and more than one unwary fisherman has had good and sufficient
cause to remember the ray's attack for weeks together. Pro-
vided in an equally formidable manner we find the sting ray
(Tryrjon pastinaca) of our southern coasts. Here the tail
reminds one of a lithe, supple whip. About its middle extent
the tail bears a prominent spine, which is not merely sharp-
pointed, but is serrated or cut into sharp, back-edged teeth
along its sides. Using the thinned out tail as a lasso, the
bayonet-like spine can be worked against an offending body to
the utmost advantage, and is likely to inflict a very severe and
ugly wound. Armed in similar fashion is the eagle ray so
SKATES AND RAYS. 171
named from the prominent and projecting nature of the breast
fins, which appear in the form of miniature wings.
Respecting their internal structure, there is much in the
build of the skate and ray bodies to stamp these fishes as in
some respects of very high organisation. They claim the
sharks and dogfishes as first cousins, and resemble the latter
forms in many characteristic and peculiar points of their
anatomy. Their skeleton to begin with their bodily frame-
work is perhaps the least perfect part of their structure ; that
is, when compared with the better developed support of com-
moner fishes. Our skate like the shark possesses a skeleton
composed in greater part of " gristle," or cartilage. Bony ele-
ments are few and far between in these fishes. The skull,
which is perhaps the most complicated part of the anatomy of
an ordinary fish, is a mere gristly box, exhibiting in its com-
position no distinct bony regions or separate divisions, but
serves, as in other fishes and vertebrates, to enclose the brain.
This latter structure, in strange contradistinction to the infe-
riority of its investment, is of very high type, and the senses of
the skates and rays are also well represented. That of smell is
well developed, judging not merely from the large size of the
parts of the brain which afford the nervous supply to the nose,
but also from the keen scent which these fishes evince for their
food or prey. The eyes are equally perfect, and the ears
internal ears, as in all lower vertebrata, being alone represented
in the rays exhibit a complexity of structure surprising in
animals of such a grade.
No part of the anatomy of these fishes, however, is more
noteworthy than the mouth and its furnishings. Perhaps one
of the most extraordinary developments in this latter respect is
presented by the eagle rays already mentioned. Looking at the
jaws of one of these fishes, the observer is reminded by the
17* SKATES AND RAYS.
arrangement of the teeth of nothing so much as a thickly paved
street. In the middle part of the jaw, the teeth are long and
narrow, and are arranged so as actually to cross the line of
union of the two jaws. At the sides of the jaws, the teeth
become smaller and six-sided, and present the appearance of a
mosaic-like pattern. Altogether such an armature is highly
characteristic, and is perfectly adapted, as one may readily con-
ceive, for serving as a veritable crushing-mill in bruising what-
ever tough bits happen to form items in the bill of fare of its
possessor. Nor are the skates and rays simply provided with a
single set or series of teeth. One of the peculiarities of fish life
in general is the continual succession and renewal of the teeth.
New teeth are supplied as fast as the old are worn away, and,
indeed, new rows are developed long before those teeth which
are being used are at all ready for replacement. The skates
and rays in general are exceedingly well supplied among their
fish-congeners in the matter of teeth, and exhibit not a few
peculiarities in their dental arrangement when compared with
their nearest neighbours, the sharks and dogfishes.
Persons not professing an intimate acquaintance with
zoology, nevertheless know the " gills " or breathing organs of
ordinary fishes. These gills exist in the neck-region of the fish,
and beneath the horny flap known as the gill cover. Each gill
in a haddock, cod, or other familiar fish, resembles a comb in
shape. It consists of an arched piece corresponding to the back
of the comb, and of numerous delicate red threads or filaments
corresponding to the teeth of that familiar object. Each thread
of the gill is really a network of minute blood-vessels, within
which the impure blood is subjected to the action of the vivify-
ing oxygen of the surrounding water, which, as any one who
has watched a gold fish knows, is constantly being taken in by
the mouth so as to bathe the gills, and is then ejected from
SKATES AND RAYS. 173
behind the gill-cover. Such is the structure of the gills in an
ordinary fish. Our skates and rays differ materially as also
do the sharks and dogfishes from common fishes in the ar-
rangement of their breathing organs. Looking at our skate we
fail to perceive any gill-cover. But in the region in which we
should have found such a structure, that is, on the under surface
of the body, and on either side, we may perceive a series of
slits. In the living skate we may see these slits expand every
now and then as currents of the water which has been used in
breathing are ejected by the sharp contraction of the gills.
These slits are the outer openings of the gills. Each slit, in
fact, leads from a curious little pouch, which also opens into
the mouth by a distinct aperture of its own. Thus we find
that water is taken into the mouth in the act of breath-
ing, passes into the gill-like pockets in the walls of which
the impure blood, driven there by the heart, is circulating
and is finally rejected by the outer slits. In the possession of
pouch-like gills, then, skates, rays, sharks, and dogfishes present
a marked peculiarity ; and they also differ from all other, save
a very few fishes, in possessing two openings called " spiracles,"
on the upper surface of the head. These openings lead into
two tubes, which in turn open into the hinder portion of the
mouth ; and water for the gills is also admitted by these
spiracles, which may be seen to open and close in the living
fish in regular sequence. Thus the skate or ray is compara-
tively independent of the mouth as an entrance for its breath-
ing-water ; and, doubtless, such a provision has a distinct refer-
ence to the readier capture of prey and seizure of food.
Space would fail us were we to trace the personal history
of these fishes farther, but there remain three points in their
biography which may be simply alluded to by way of sugges-
tion as to the interest which awaits the reader and observer
174 SKATES AND RAYS.
who may make the better acquaintance of the skates and rays.
Thus, firstly, we know of huge developments of certain species
of these fishes, whereby they appear to exemplify the veritable
giants of the first class. The horned rays or Cephalopterce of
the Mediterranean Sea may thus attain an immense size, may
measure twenty feet long, twenty-eight feet in width, and may
weigh over a ton. Such were the dimensions of a specimen
actually captured. At Marseilles large specimens of these
fishes are often landed, and it may well be understood how
cautious the Mediterranean fishermen are in attempting the
capture of such veritable monsters of the deep. Equally inter-
esting is it to find that the eggs of the skates and rays are
enclosed in tough cases, which, under the name of " mermaid's
purses," are often to be picked up in an empty condition on the
sea beach. Should the holiday-maker by the sea be fortunate
enough to find a " sea purse " with the embryo enclosed, he
will be interested by the spectacle of the little skate or ray
coiled up, head and tail together the features of the adult,
although represented in miniature, being still recognisable in
the little embryo which lies imprisoned within the seaweed-like
egg-capsule referred to.
A final feature of no small interest in skate-history, is that
included in the remark that this family contains at least one
member which finds a place in the lists of " electrical fishes."
It is a well-known fact that certain fishes possess organs whereby
they are enabled to give electrical shocks of surprising force
and power. Such are the electric eels of South American rivers,
and the Malapterurus of the Kile, from a specimen of which
the writer recently received a shock which numbed his arm for
several hours afterwards. The electric ray, well named the
torpedo, and popularly known as the " cramp fish," is another
example of these curious fishes. The torpedo and its kind are
SKATES AND RAYS. 175
found on our southern coasts and in warmer seas. On each side
of the head exists an " electrical organ," somewhat resembling
a honeycomb in appearance, and consisting of structures richly-
supplied with nerves. It is notable that the more common-
place rays possess an inactive and useless rudiment of the elec-
trical organ on each side of the tail. The production of electricity
by this organ may be readily understood as involving merely
a modification of the ordinary nerve-force of the body. When
the nerve-force of our bodies is sent to muscles, it is converted
into motion, the muscle being the organ which converts and
transforms the one force into the other. So with the electricity
of the fish. Nerve-force supplied to the special organ in ques-
tion is converted into electricity, and thus serves as a means
of offence and of defence as well. That the nerve-force of the
body is the source of the electrical force cannot be doubted,
since the shocks become less and less powerful as the nerve-
force becomes exhausted through over-stimulation of the fish.
The whole apparatus in the torpedo reminds one of the arrange-
ment known as a " voltaic battery ; " and the fact that in the
skates and rays such a form of apparatus must have existed for
untold ages prior to man's epoch, affords another illustration of
the wise man's adage that " there is nothing new under the
sun."
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A
BAENACLE.
IN your seaside strolls, I dare say you have frequently met with
specimens of the race to which I belong, whilst in the graving-
dock of your nearest seaport town you may meet with us in
hundreds attached to the sides of ships, like a race of parasitic
dependents brought from some warmer clime. I do not know
whether you have ever thought twice over our identity and
nature. The question, " What is a barnacle ? " is not perhaps
an attractive one in the ears of most folks ; and I dare say there
are half a dozen ways in which humanity might reply to the
query. There is, of course, a goose of the name, but the bird is
no relation of mine. I should have called it a " goose " were that
not its appellation already, on account of its somewhat far-fetched
connection, even in name, with a family like ours. Max Miiller
will tell you, if you care to dip into his lectures, that the name
" Barnacle," as applied to the goose, is in reality a corruption of
the word " Hibernia ; " and although certain wiseacres notably
one old Gerarde who wrote "The Herball "used to assert that
he and others had seen young geese growing within our shells,
and that we in turn grew on a tree, I may simply assert such
statements to be figments of Gerarde's imagination. We have
no connection whatever with the geese. They are at one end of
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE. 177
the animal world, and we reside nearly at the other extremity.
So let us dismiss, once for all, the barnacle-goose as no relation
of mine. But, in the second place, I have heard the name
" barnacles " applied to a species of spectacles of large size and
ancient make. If I have little connection with the goose, I
have still less with the spectacles, and I need not delay by
saying more of the unlawful associations which our name has
now and then had attached to it.
But the question still remains, " What is a barnacle ? "
And, as I am about to tell you the story of myself, I may say,
without being deemed over bold, that I am the proper person
to answer the query. To begin at the beginning, let me ask
you in turn whether you have ever noticed the little conical
shells which grow by the thousands on the rocks at low water
mark, and are crushed by the dozen as you scramble over the
rocks in your seaside ramble ? If you procure a piece of stone
or an oyster-shell on which these little shells grow, and place
the said stone or oyster-shell in water, you will see a sight worth
looking at. From the upper part of the little conical dwelling-
place will come forth a curious little set of plumes, which will
wave backwards and forwards in the water with a regular and
incessant motion. If you touch the shell you will find its tenant
to take alarm. The little plumes will be at once withdrawn ;
snap! will go the little lid at the top of the shell; and the
tenant in question will withdraw itself for a time into the
retirement and obscurity of private life. Then, after a suitable
interval, the door will be cautiously reopened, the plumes
extended, and in a short time the activity of our small friend in
the shell will be perfectly and completely resumed.
Now, this being in the shell is a poor relation of mine. He
belongs to a subordinate branch of the barnacle family, although
I admit he has most of the characters and belongings of our race.
178 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE.
He is called in familiar language the " sea acorn ; " but scientific
persons name him Balanus, and perhaps, out of compliment to
the people who study us most and who know most about us, I
had better use the latter appellation. Thus around the coasts
of Britain our family is well represented, and, indeed, in well-
nigh every sea you will find examples of the tribe. My special
habitat is a piece of floating drift-wood, or the sides of ships ; the
graving-dock becoming, of course, a scene of the massacre of our
race. We have been credited with delaying the passage of ships
through the water by reason of our numbers, but this latter
statement I regard as an exaggeration and a libel on our kind.
It is not our fault if Nature has given us a special facility for
attaching ourselves to fixed objects. Our feet are of no use in
our adult state at least for swimming, and hence, unless you
interfere with the mere fact of our existence, you must admit
our right to dispose ourselves to the best advantage in our ways
of life. Some members of the barnacle family, I may lastly
remark, are somewhat peculiar in their choice of a habitation.
One or two near neighbours of mine actually fix themselves to
the backs of whales and the sides of sharks. Such an existence
would not suit me ; but, of course, there is no accounting for
taste in barnacles any more satisfactorily than in human beings.
Having thus finished a brief survey of my friends and
relations, I may now say something about myself. If you wish
to understand me thoroughly and completely you should read
Mr. Darwin's history of our tribe. That will show you that one
of your greatest philosophers did not deem us beneath his notice,
and he will tell you therein that there are a good many points
in our history which present very deep puzzles and problems to
the most learned of mankind. But to make my acquaintance
in a superficial fashion is not a difficult matter.
I possess a triangular shell, enclosing my body, and attached
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE. 179
to the fixed object drift-wood or ship as the case may be by
a fleshy muscular stalk called a "peduncle." This "shell" of
mine is a very different structure from the oyster's possession.
I am not egotistical, but I make bold to say mine is the more
complicated and handsomer shell of the two. It consists of some
five pieces, two at the sides above, two at the sides below, and
a lower piece called the " keel," because it occupies much the
same position in my shell that the keel does in a boat. I told
. you that my relation the Balanus, or " Sea Acorn," possessed a
series of beautiful plumes which waved continually in the water,
and which could be protruded from the shell, and also with-
drawn at will. I am similarly provided with no less than
twenty -four of these appendages, which are called "cirri" by
our friends the naturalists, and which popularly and collectively
compose my "glass-hand." In this "hand "of mine there are
twenty-four fingers, which I use as plumes to sweep the water
around, by way of drawing food-particles into my mouth. I am,
in fact, like a persistent beggar, for my hand is always open,
and my commissariat is continually being replenished by the
sweeping fingers in question. I may be misleading you, how-
ever, in speaking of these filaments as " fingers " and of my
plumes as a "hand." Properly regarded, they represent my
" feet." How this curious transformation comes about you will
learn later on, but you may meanwhile rest content to know, on
the authority of a great naturalist, that one of the chief cha-
racters of the barnacle race is found in the fact that we kick our
food into our mouths with our legs. It is, I admit, not a seemly
procedure to speak of, and savours too much of the acrobat to be
thoroughly respectable ; but you must not judge barnacles by
a strictly human standard, and after all I do not see why a
handy foot may not, for purposes of the kind just mentioned,
be as convenient an organ as a hand*
i8o THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE.
As regards my internal economy, you would find that I am
by no means of lowly structure, but possess the usual apparatus
for maintaining existence such as you expect an animal of
average rank in the kingdom to exhibit. It is true I have no
distinct heart, but in the absence of that organ I contrive to live
perfectly, and well. I am by no means an epicure, but I enjoy
to the full the titbits which my " glass-hand " sweeps in from
the outer world, and I possess a full and complete digestive
system, whereby the wants of the body may be supplied.
Neither am I of an unfeeling race, for we possess a very well-
defined set of nerves in the shape of a double chain of nervous
cords lying along the floor of my body. Organs of sense I do
not set much store by, because, probably, I do not require them,
being a stay-at-home being, and not resembling in disposition
those near neighbours of mine, the crabs and lobsters, which are
always on the move especially the crabs. But I do possess
a pair of eyes, not of very definite type, it is true. You would
probably call them mere specks of colour, and so, indeed, they
are; still, they serve my purpose, and the latter remark
excludes all criticism of an unfriendly kind.
So much for my internal anatomy. WJiat more need be said
regarding myself, in reality, resolves itself into the history of
my development, or, in other words, the story of how I came
to be what I am. If you were to ask Mr. Darwin to which por-
tion of my history he would attach the greatest value, he would
reply, my development. This marked appreciation of my early
history is easily explained. Mr. Darwin will tell you that in the
history of the individual's production you may see, as in a
moving panorama, the history of its race. Of course you may
not agree with the eminent philosopher just named ; but I know
that in barnacle-circles his views are regarded as most satis-
factory, because you observe they teed to bring us nearer to the
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE. 181
aristocracy of the animal world, and to place us in virtue of our
descent on a par with apparently much higher forms of life.
My first appearance on the stage of time was in the form of an
egg a very minute, trifling thing, no doubt, but still an egg,
with all the probabilities and possibilities, all the trials and
sorrows, hopes and fears, of barnacle-life locked up within its
narrow limits. After a few preliminary changes not worth
noting at present, save to remark that they tell me all living
beings have to undergo similar transformations at first I was
fairly launched, in a literal sense, on the sea of life. The earliest
impressions of which I have any recollection are those of escap-
ing into the sea from the shell of my parent. Around me were
swimming a large number of very curious-looking little beings,
each possessing a body somewhat of triangular shape, ending
behind in a very well-marked tail, and in front having two side-
projections, resembling horns. " Well ! you are a curious set of
beings," was my first remark to these little comrades of mine.
" Hear, hear ! " said one of them ; " why, don't you know you
are one of us ? " and of course the remark at once corrected any
vain notions I might have entertained regarding myself. The
queer creatures with the tails were, of course, my youthful
brothers and sisters, who, like myself, had just been liberated
from the care of our fixed and rooted parent so soon, alas ! are
family ties snapped in barnacle existence. Here we were left
to ourselves in our infantile stage, and without a guardian in all
the days of our youth.
In front of my body I possessed a mouth, opening on a kind
of raised margin, and around the mouth were set three pairs of
legs, of which the two hinder pairs were cleft at their tips.
Like the cyclops the " water-flea," I mean, a far-off cousin of
mine I possessed a single eye. And thus provided, as the
baby-barnacle, I was launched on my travels, being named by
i82 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE.
those kindly persons, the scientific zoologists (who are well-nigh
the only persons who take an interest in us), a Naitplius. This
term, please to recollect, is just the scientific name of a baby-
barnacle. Swimming about day by day, and picking up what-
ever food-particles came in my way, I grew rapidly. My first
coat or skin becoming too small, I had to cast it off, but found
Mother Nature had already in her mindfulness provided another
garment below the first. After moulting two or three times I
approached the period of my youth. I became more sedate and
less inclined to swim through the sea : and my next epoch began
with my attaining a new livery as the mark and badge of my
growing condition. I found myself, after a certain moult, in the
possession of a body, which was unlike that of the Nauplius,
and which, indeed, I could not at first recognise as my own. My
body was now of oval shape, and I had attained to the dignity
of a " shell." Not a very perfect shell a small, folded down,
thin kind of thing it was, just like that of a water-flea nothing
like the one I now possess, but still a shell ; and I dare say I
regarded myself as having advanced a stage in the world, very
much as a young miss, who, having discarded short dresses,
thinks she is somebody in her long skirt and train. But my
changes were not limited to the development of a shell. My
first pair of limbs had become wonderfully transformed, so much
so indeed that I hardly knew them. No longer like limbs, they
had become " organs of prehension," as my scientific friends say,
or, in plainer language, things for holding on by. I had parted
with the other two pairs which you will remember I possessed
as the infant-Nauplius, and not even the stumps of them
remained. But my fears as to my limbless condition were soon
calmed by the growth of six pairs of curious feet, not by any
means so elegant as the pair I had lost, but provided with stiff
bristles, and thus very well adapted for swimming.
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE. 183
I imagiiaed I was getting on in the world at a great rate,
when, in place of my single eye, I found, on waking up one fine
morning, I had two of quite a superior kind; but whatever
feelings of congratulation I may have had on this latter point
were somewhat dashed by the discovery that, in this second
stage of my development, I had no mouth. How I nourished
myself I cannot tell. Probably there was no need for much
nourishment in this second stage of mine ; but in any case there
I was, mouthless, but provided with two big eyes, with a pair of
long hold-fasts in front, and six pairs of feet. I was now the
" Pupa barnacle," a term which I hear is meant to denote a
similarity to the chrysalis stage in the insects. Internally, at
this stage, my organisation must have proceeded apace. Two
curious glands called "cement-glands" were beginning to be
formed on each side of my digestive system, and these glands in
due time came to open in my hold-fasts, or front pair of feelers.
Next came an all-important epoch in my life. I am credibly
informed that in higher life there is a process described as that
of " sowing one's wild oats," and that this procedure, bearing no
reference to an agricultural operation, is meant to indicate the
free and ingenuous life of youth, prior to the invasion of the
sobriety and decorous demeanour of mature life. At the time I
speak of, my period of " settling down " had, all unknown to
me, arrived. One day I found myself in company with about a
dozen of barnacles in a similar stage of development to myself,
clinging by means of our hold-fasts to a piece of floating wood.
What we were doing there I do not suppose any of us could tell,
but there we were, holding on to the wood, and more curious
still, we gradually found that we were being fastened firmly
thereto by the action of the cement from the glands I have
spoken of. You have, I believe, a very useful fluid called
' ' marine glue," warranted to withstand the action of water.
1 84 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE.
Well, our cement was such a glue ; but when I remind you that
we were being fastened head downwards by this cement to the
wood, I think you will admit our position must have appeared
floating somewhat ridiculous in the eyes of a disinterested
observer.
Worse still, my eyes disappeared, and left me in total dark-
ness. Of the changes which took place during this interval of
blindness I can give no account. Suffice it to say that when I
awoke to consciousness I discovered myself in possession of my
perfect shell; and I found that my six pair of legs had each
become divided to form the twenty-four fingers of my " glass-
hand." I also saw that I was firmly attached to the floating
wood by my fleshy stalk which had grown out of my hold-fasts
and cement-glands in a word, I awoke to find myself the
barnacle you see before you. There are various persons belong-
ing to the world of science who tell me that I am a good example
of physiological backsliding. Well, so be it. I suppose by
their " retrograde development," as they term it, they mean to
declare that I am a less highly developed animal in my adult
stage than I was in the days of my youth. As to that I say
nothing ; but I do say that a barnacle is a barnacle only when it
is like me, and I maintain I am now in reality quite as typical
and perfect a being in my way as when I roamed far and wide
in the sea, and did not always think so seriously of life as I do
now. At any rate I have one comfort I am not nearly such
a low animal as the Sacculinas, that attach themselves to crabs,
and which, although beginning life like me as Nauplii, yet grow
down into the condition of insignificant little sausages or bags,
rooted to their hosts, the crabs, and showing little or no sign of
life whatever. And although I cannot boast of being so high in
the world as the crabs and shrimps, still I feel some comfort in
knowing that the infant crab is very like the infant barnacle,
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE. 185
whilst the young water-fleas and other beings quite of the upper
classes begin life just as I do.
This reminds me of what I said long ago, that my friend Mr.
Darwin thinks that when animals are alike in their development,
they are to be regarded as true blood relations, and as chips of the
same old block. Now of what particular block did the barnacles
come, do you think, and which chips most resemble the barnacle
family in their nature ? The answer to this important question
concerning our pedigree may be found by referring to the baby-
barnacle, or Nauplius, with the triangular body and the three
pairs of feet. You will think it a peculiar fact, no doubt, that
such widely different animals as crabs, shrimps, water-fleas, and
barnacles, are developed in exactly the same way. Yet it is never-
theless a plain truth. It would puzzle you exceedingly to say
sometimes whether a Nauplius was a baby-barnacle, or a youth-
ful crab, or a young water-flea so closely do we resemble each
other in early life. Your crab that crawls on the sea-beach has
a splendid tail in early life, this appendage dwindling away, and
becoming "small by degrees and beautifully less," until it
appears as the merest vestige in the form of the " purse," tucked
under the crab's body (which is all head and chest), and which
children are fond of pulling down to see how much money Mr.
Cancer Pagurus may possess. Thus a crab, who is very different
from the barnacle in adult life, resembles me closely enough
in youth. We begin life on equal terms, but he advances
whilst I lag behind. Such, I am told, is often the way of the
world in higher societies than mine. But, at any rate, you see
quite plainly what I contend for. If we crustaceans, as we call
ourselves crabs, water-fleas, lobsters, barnacles, etc. all begin
life much in the same guise, as the Nauplius, or something very
like it, it stands to reason that our original progenitor, and the
founder of the whole, must have been something like the baby-
1 86 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BARNACLE.
barnacle itself. After such a revelation, you will not despise the
barnacles, but think of us, perhaps, as a curious race of beings
with a curious history of our own. And perchance you may
likewise learn from my story that even in the humblest history
there may be a great many more things than are dreamt of in
your philosophy. Good-bye.
LEAVES.
No organs of plants are so common as leaves, and yet, strangely
enough, there are few parts of a plant with the functions and
uses of which ordinary people are less acquainted. It may
therefore form a pleasant if not profitable study, if we venture
to give some plain ideas concerning the structures which add so
largely to the grace and beauty of our fair world. Our first re-
mark regarding leaves may take shape in the form of the query,
"What is a leaf?" To this it may be replied that a leaf is a
side-expansion of the skin or integument of the plant. In this
respect there is some analogy to be drawn between a leaf and
the wing of an insect, which is also an extension of the animal's
outer layer, and which, like the leaf, is supported by veins or
ribs. How, in the next instance, is a leaf developed, and what
is its origin and mode of growth ? Like the stem of the plant
itself, like the branch on which it is borne, like the flowers
which crown the life of the plant, the leaf is developed in and
from a " bud." One of the most curious studies of the botanist
is that of tracing how leaves are folded in the bud. Each plant
has its leaves folded within the leaf-buds in a particular fashion.
Thus, for instance, in the oak the young leaf is folded from the
midrib, in halves, so that the upper surfaces of the leaf are
pressed together. In the vine and maple, beech and birch, the
188 LEA VES.
leaves are folded like fans when in the bud ; and as every one
knows who has watched a fern growing, the leaves of those
plants are rolled up in a fashion which reminds one of the
bishop's crosier.
Every leaf springs from a point of the stem which the
botanist designates as a " node ; " and it is interesting to note
that the leaf-blade is as a rule spread horizontally, and with one
surface to the earth and the other to the sky. It is a highly
curious observation that in some plants the leaf appears to
be actually twisted by nature ; whilst in some Australian plants
the edges of the leaf occupy the place of the flat surfaces, and
are turned to the earth and sky respectively. To regard the
mass of foliage seen on a tree as an orderly arranged series of
organs, might seem to be a far-fetched thought. But the
botanist assures us that leaves are arranged in each plant
according to one of several modes. Thus in some plants we see
the leaves placed opposite each other on the stem or branch ; in
others again, each succeeding leaf is placed above and opposite
to its predecessor ; whilst we may sometimes see a whole circle
of leaves given off at one point as in the glutinous goose-grass
of our hedgerows. It is somewhat of a technical study to ex-
plain the manner in which the botanist constructs a formula to
express the particular leaf-arrangement of any plant ; but the
importance of his work in this direction can be readily under-
stood when we reflect that the true nature of certain parts of
plants becomes known to us through the accurate determination
of leaves and their arrangement. Thus a fir-cone is simply a
collection of modified leaves arranged in a highly characteristic
spiral manner. An onion and a lily bulb, and all other " bulbs,"
commonly mistaken for roots, are in reality " stems ; " a fact
proved by the modified fleshy or scaly leaves with which they
are covered. So that we may in fact distinguish a root from a
LEA VES. 189
stem by the fact that the latter is capable of producing leaves,
whilst the former has no such power.
Each leaf consists, as a general rule, of the stalk and blade
the " petiole " and " lamina " of the botanist ; but a very slight
exercise of our observation may serve to show us that some-
times leaves want stalks, and are attached directly to the stem
of their blades. To properly understand the modifications in
form which leaves may undergo, we require to bear in mind
that in some plants the leaf-stalk may be well-nigh as broad as
the blade of the leaf itself ; and in some Australian acacias the
leaf-stalks actually become modified to form leaves when the
true leaves have withered and died away. These acacias repre-
sent the plants already alluded to as possessing leaves which are
set with their edges vertically instead of with their flat surfaces
to earth and sky. The manner in which leaves are united to
the stem or branch occasionally produces peculiarities in plants.
It is thus no mere poetic fancy to speak of the " light quivering
aspen ; " since we find that the leaf-stalk of that tree is flattened
from side to side that is, at right angles to the blade and thus
catches the lightest breath of wind, with the result of causing
the leaves to tremble when the leaves of other plants are at rest.
The modifications which the leaves of certain foreign plants
undergo may be of very extraordinary kind. Every reader
must know something of the curious Dionsea, or Venus' Flytrap,
a native of North American marshes, which possesses its leaf-
blades divided into two halves, so that they may close together,
when the sensitive hairs which stand erect on the leaf-blade are
touched by an unwary insect. Not only does this curious leaf
serve as an insect-trap, however. It acts as a veritable stomach,
digesting and assimilating in perfect fashion the flies it captures.
The Venus' Flytrap, moreover, is not alone in the peculiar use
to which its leaves are put. The sundews, common in our
190 LEA VES.
marshes, capture insects, and digest them by means of the
sensitive hair-like tentacles, which are provided with a viscid or
glutinous fluid. So also in the Pitcher Plants and .Side-saddle
plants, the " pitcher " is a structure supposed to be formed by
the large development of the leaf-stalk, whilst the blade of the
leaf forms the lid. These latter plants also capture insects by
aid of their curiously modified leaves. The leaves of certain
plants may, however, be simply irritable and sensitive without
being devoted to the capture of prey. Thus we know of the
Sensitive Plant, of Shelley's charming poem, the "fan-like
leaves " of which droop on the slightest touch, their leaflets
becoming huddled together on the stalk. And it is noteworthy
that the leaves of the Sensitive Plant may be chloroformed as if
they were animals, and so as to utterly destroy their sensitive-
ness ; the leaves recovering from the anesthetic after the lapse
of a suitable interval. The leaves of the Wood-sorrel are found
to be sensitive in daylight when the leaf-stalk is smartly tapped ;
and in the Moving Plant of India the leaflets appear to be in a
state of constant movement during the day, and even during
darkness, the advent of which produces certain remarkable actions
and variations, to be presently noted, in plant-life at large.
The statement of Goethe that every appendage of the stem
of a plant is in reality a " leaf" of some kind or another, is not
difficult of proof. One very plain demonstration of this fact is
to be found in cases of " double flowers." The outer green part
of every flower is called the calyx, and this portion is evidently
composed of leaves. The coloured part of the flower, or corolla,
composed of petals, also evidently consists of leaves. But the
stamens, or little stalked organs seen in the inside of the flower,
and which manufacture the yellow dust or pollen necessary for
fertilising the " ovules " (or " seeds "), do not resemble leaves at
all ; and it might be thought that Goethe's maxim would fail
LEAVES. 191
when applied to the stamens. Where the course of ordinary
development fails to afford a solution to the puzzles of nature,
we frequently find the clue in cases of abnormal or unwonted
development. Suppose, for example, that we trace the growth
of the stamens in a double rose, such as the Rosa centifolia of
the botanist. There we may see represented, in one flower, all the
stages through which the petals become converted into stamens,
and by means of which a leaf becomes folded and modified to
form the little pollen-producing organ, or vice versa. In the
water-lilies the transformation of stamens into petals is well seen.
More common modifications of leaves are, however, to be noted
in the shape of tendrils. The idea of a tendril as a climbing
support is so well known, that the term has passed into the
domain of poetic metaphor and imagery. The tendril becomes
highly interesting to the botanist not merely because of its
relation to the leaf, but from the fact that tendrils may be
formed from organs and parts of plants other than leaves. A
simple tendril is seen in the common pea, which climbs up the
stakes placed for its support by aid of these organs. If we look
at the leaf of the pea we may see that it is a compound organ,
and consists of leaflets attached to a central leaf-stalk. At the
extremity of the leaf, the leaflets disappear, and in their place
we see the delicate thread-like tendrils. These latter organs
are given off from the sides of the leaf-stalk, and we also note
that the tip of the leaf is drawn out to form a tendril. Thus
we readily come to the conclusion that the tendrils of the pea
are formed by modified leaflets. Suppose now that we examine
the vine. We find that in the latter plant the tendrils appear
to be formed by veritable branches, and not merely by modified
leaves ; whilst certain other parts may in other plants be modi-
fied to assist a weak stem in maintaining its hold of a support.
The " veins " of leaves form well-known parts of these
I 9 2 LEA VES.
organs, and the botanist has drawn certain important distinctions
between the venation or arrangement of the veins in the leaves
of different plants. If we look at the leaf of a nettle having
due regard to the powers of its stinging-hairs of a lime-tree, of
a primrose, or any other common tree or plant, we see that the
veins form a network, the beauty of which is fully appreciated
by those who make skeleton-leaves. In the leaf of a lily, of a
grass, of a tulip, or of a palm-tree, we see that the veins do not
unite but run parallel with one another, whilst in the hart's
tongue fern, or any other fern with a broad frond, we may
observe that each vein becomes forked as it is given off from
the midrib of the leaf. Now, curiously enough, each of these
three kinds of venation is characteristic of a great division of
the vegetable world. All the highest plants (or exogens) have
leaves the veins of which form a network. Parallel-veined
leaves belong to the palms, grasses, lilies, etc. the endogens
of the botanist ; and " forked " veins are only found in ferns.
The character of a plant may therefore be determined in a
general fashion, by merely looking at the veins of its leaf.
The microscope has made us acquainted with many interest-
ing facts regarding the structure and functions of leaves. A
thin skin exists on each surface of the blade, and incloses
numberless little cells laden with green colouring-matter (or
chlorophyll), and forming the delicate leaf-tissue, which, in its
turn, is supported by the tough fibres of the veins. The minute
cells of the upper surface of the leaf are much more closely
packed together than those of the under surface. In the latter
part of the leaf, spaces exist between the cells. Many of these
spaces open on the under surface of the leaf by minute open-
ings called " stomata ; " each of these openings being guarded
by two half-moon-shaped cells. These openings are the literal
"mouths" of the plant. Through them gases are inhaled and
LEAVES. 193
exhaled, and thus serve for the nourishment and other vital
actions of the plant. By means of the stomata also, the important
act of "transpiration" is performed. In dry weather the stomata
are closed, so that the plant may retain its moisture; but when the
atmosphere is moist, and when the plant may obtain a due supply
of water by the root, the stomata open and permit the excess of
water to escape from the leaves in the form of invisible vapour.
The gas upon which plants depend for subsistence is, as our
readers already know, the carbonic acid exhaled by animals,
and of deadly character when rebreathed in any great quantity
into the animal frame. This gas is a compound of carbon and
oxygen ; the latter, in its pure state, being the gas required for
the respiration of animals. Bearing these facts in mind, we
may ascertain the indebtedness of the animal world at large to
plants, when we discover that by means of their leaves, plants
absorb the noxious carbonic acid as part of their food; decompose
it, that is split it up into its component carbon and oxygen ;
retain the carbon for food ; and liberate or restore the oxygen
to the atmosphere for the use of the animals. Plants are thus
types of the unselfish in nature. But to perform this kindly
office of removing carbonic acid from the air, and of restoring
oxygen to us, two conditions are required. These are, firstly,
that the plant must possess chlorophyll or green colouring-
matter; and secondly, that it be exposed to light. Plants
(such as fungi) destitute of green colour, inhale oxygen and
give out carbonic acid like animals ; and green plants exhibit a
similar action in the dark. Thus it may be estimated how great
a difference the advent of night brings with it to the plant-world ;
and we may also note the curious fact that the plant which acts
in opposition to the animal during the day, becomes a veritable
animal in its breathing when the sunshine disappears and the
night falls.
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY.
IT is but seldom that a member of the insect race is permitted
to address beings of a station in life superior to himself. But
as the opportunity has been presented to me, I should be rude
and somewhat neglectful of the interests of my race were I to
allow it to pass without saying a good word for flies in general,
and for the particular branch of the family to which I belong.
We are usually regarded as a happy-go-lucky, idle race of
beings. Even the Wise Man himself found in our apparent
frivolity a subject of remark. Poets have selected me as the
type of extreme foolishness, and the nursery rhymes of children
do not fail to present me in the same light to the youthful
mind. Hence I am reminded of a proverb which says, " Give
a dog a bad name, and hang him." In the language of the fly-
family, I should say, " Credit a fly with being a useless insect,
and crush him." You lay traps for us, gilded outside and fur-
nished with a sugary solution, for which, I must confess, we
have a decided weakness. Only, I would also beg to remark,
that the liking for sweets is at the same time a natural instinct
of our race, and one, moreover, from which mankind, judging
from the numerous emporiums of sweetstuffs I have observed,
is by no means free. Sometimes, too, you poison us with a
subtle paper, the aroma of which steals into our brains and
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY. 195
nerves and paralyzes us ; and in any and every way, from the
employment of the chemist's art to the use of the clumsy
duster, we are assaulted and pursued. This is very hard ; but
even Dame Nature herself, of whom we are all entitled to think
kindly indeed, has ordained that we should fall victims to the
traps laid for us hy many plants, and to the deceit and cunning
of certain near relations of ours, the spiders. Of the latter family,
the less said the better. If we cannot boast of their superior
brain and cunning, if we do not toil and spin as they do, we at
least have clear consciences, for I do not regard our occasional
raids on the cream jug and sugar basin as anything more serious
than the petty larceny and as the little perquisites which Dame
Nature perfectly justifies in a world, wherein one of your great
philosophers has told us there is a perpetual " struggle for exist-
ence." On the whole I am thankful I am not a spider ; and
despite the idea that these creatures are " superior persons " to
the flies, I think, if you investigate their history, you will find
not a few traits of character with which you will be extremely
horrified, not to say perplexed. We live on perfectly amicable
terms with each other, and actions for assault and battery are
unknown amongst us. But they do say and although this is
gossip, still I have it on the best authority that the lady-
spiders maul and beat their husbands unmercifully. The poor
gentlemen have not the life of the most miserable fly ; and a
near relation of mine told me that, on one occasion, when
perched in a secure position, he saw an unfortunate male spider
devoured by his mate. Now, we may be frivolous, but you
will admit we are preferable to these cannibal neighbours of
ours in more ways than one.
I have been told that when, in higher life, you desire to
announce the absence of kinship between yourself and some
other person, you say, " No connection with the party over the
196 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY.
way." Permit me to say, likewise, that we flies have no rela-
tionship whatever with the spider fraternity. Many excellent
persons who have not made our intimate acquaintance, are apt
to class spiders and flies together. But I would remind you
that we are " insects," whilst the spiders form a group which
learned persons have named " Arachnidans " a term derived,
so I have heard, from the name of a foolish young person named
Arachne, who challenged Minerva, the goddess of wisdom, to a
trial of skill in spinning, and who was changed into a spider
for her temerity. Be it observed then, that we are not spiders.
They have eight legs, we have only six a number, I make
bold to say, more convenient than the former. They have no
wings, we have two ; and although most other insects possess
four wings, still we find that with our two appendages we
manage to get along very comfortably ; and besides, you know,
there are some higher creatures than ourselves who possess but
two wings. Then the spider race have no feelers ; we have a
pair of very delicate organs of touch, and our susceptibilities
are in consequence of a much more refined caste than those of
the cannibal race just mentioned. They have a few paltry eyes
scattered over the top of their heads. Did you ever see our
eyes ? No. Then just you look at the sides of my head, and
you will see two great masses of eyes, the structure of which,
seen through a microscope, will cause you to open your own
organs of sight more widely than before. You would not
imagine, I suppose, that I had about four thousand eyes. I
assure you that is the case. The fly race is not given to
mendacity, but if you doubt me ask your friend the zoologist.
He will tell you my statement is perfectly correct. So that
when you attempt to exterminate us in our little attentions to
the sugar bowl, you can well understand why you should so
seldom catch a fly. We sec you long before you think we notice
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY. 197
your movements ; and as for eyes in the back of our head
well, we possess them all round our heads, and hence we are
just as wary as Nature intended we should be.
The other points of difference betwixt the spider race and
ourselves may be briefly summed up by stating that the former
do not come into the world in such a curious fashion as we do.
But of this more anon. And they breathe differently from us ;
whilst, their heads and chests being stuck firmly together, you
will admit they cannot possess that ease and grace which we
display in the regions just mentioned. I shall therefore say
no more of the spiders, now that I have satisfied you we are
a distinct race of persons. And I shall now ask your attention
to what I believe to be a much more important topic I mean
myself.
Of course there are flies and flies, just as there are Smiths
and Smiths amongst yourselves. My family is one of the most
typical. Our especial cognomen is Musca, and my own twig of
the family-tree is the domestica branch. Hence, when I am at
home, I am known as Musca domestica, which is the scientific
name for the Common House-fly. Some of my nearest relatives
cousins you would call them, I dare say are also well
known to you. There is the " blue-bottle," a term I hear often
applied in derision to preservers of the peace in higher life
I do not know why; and there is the flesh-fly, with whose
tastes I do not agree, although the species in question has its
own uses in nature's economy. Even so notorious a fly as the
" Tsetse " is a far-off cousin of mine, and I am reminded by
its existence, and by the fact of its poisonous bite, that I
should be charitable in speaking even of those reprobates the
spiders. The name " fly " is much abused in nature. This
honourable distinction is applied without any real cause to
such parties and insects as the dragon-flies, may- flies, and
198 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY.
day-flies, and to other members of the insect class as far
removed from me and mine as you are from the Chinaman or
the Tartar. The day-fly is a poor thing which passes its early
days in water, comes out of its shell in the morning, and dies
at night. I have attended a large number of their funerals
even in the afternoon. So that these far-oif friends of mine
never seem to get beyond the infant stage of existence, whilst
we attain a respectable age. We live at least for a summer,
unless the papier-mouche deludes us to a premature end, or
the fly-trap checks our budding hopes and aspirations. Many
of us even sleep through the winter, when we can discover a
secure bedroom and some kindly shelter; and we may thus
appear in the next spring, like giants refreshed by a long
winter's nap. Flies thus are a very distinct race, with their
two wings dragon-flies and day-flies have four, but they do
not fly one whit better than we do with our distinct globular
heads, our big eyes, and our curious mouths, of which more
anon.
You ask me what has become of our hinder pair of wings.
Do you know where last summer's leaves are, or where the
rainbow goes when it disappears from your gaze ? Do not think
my query impertinent, for really, where our hinder wings have
gone, or why they have disappeared, nobody knows. There is
a legend in the fly-family that once we did possess four wings.
And I must say that some colour is given to this supposition by
the fact that we possess two curious little appendages where the
missing wings should be. Some people call these appendages
"poisers" and "balancers," though why they should have
received this name is more than any sensible fly to whom I
have mentioned the matter could tell. Somebody has evi-
dently thought that we " balanced " ourselves by aid of these
filaments as if, indeed, we were as weak in the head as a
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY. 199
human rope-dancer or acrobat. But there these poisers are, and
how they came there, or what they are, no one can definitely
say. I myself believe that they are the rudiments of our
hind-wings, "which grew small by degrees and beautifully
less," by order of Nature, until we were left with two wings ;
and, as I maintained before, I regard ourselves as superior to
the insects with four.
It has been reported to me that human physiognomists are
largely given to judge human character by the shape and form
of the mouth. Now in fly existence, and indeed in insect life
at large, there is a deal of character to be found in the latter
region. Take those sombre gentlemen the beetles. They have
a mouth wherein is plenty of jaw. Then there are our delicate
lady-friends and fops, the butterflies; they have the longest
tongues you ever saw. The bees and wasps are half-way
between the beetles and the butterflies, and they are really a
very clever family, being able to do a great deal of very difficult
work with their mouths. Though a somewhat sharp, ill-
tempered, and easily-provoked race, I still respect the bees and
wasps, but they certainly owe a good deal to their mouths.
Now, where do the flies stand in the matter of their mouths ?
I reply, as a kind of offshoot of the wasp and bee type. Let
me sum up our belongings for you. Watch me alight in your
sugar bowl, and keep your eye steadily fixed on my head. As
soon as I drop down on the crystalline particles in the basin,
you see an organ, that looks almost like one of my legs, folded
down from under my head, and you may see me scrape up the
sugar with this long spoon. Now that is my tongue, and a
very fine tongue too. It is formed by what in the beetle exists
^as a mere under-lip to the mouth, and you see that the end of
my tongue is very curious. It is broad and leaf-like, and opens
out in two joints, which are unbent in a very complicated
200 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY.
manner, which I can no more describe to you than you could
tell me the structure and mechanism of your tongue. But by
aid of this broad leaf, I can rasp down your sugar particles, and
I manage in a very short time to make a very hearty meal of
whatever substance I may be permitted to partake. You will
now be able to understand although in saying so I am,
perhaps, injudiciously showing you a grave fault of ours why,
after a hot summer, when our population has been very much
increased, the nicely bound books on your drawing-room table
(where, of course, they exist only for ornament), or your beau-
tifully polished furniture should be scratched. It is a bad
habit, I know, but we cannot help it ; when we alight on
any surface we must touch and rub it with our tongues. The
rough surface of the tongue acts like a fine file, and causes you
many sighs that flies are permitted to exist. Blame Nature, my
dear friend, for so providing us do not blame us. We are just
like yourselves, the creatures of habit ; so please be charitable,
and reflect rather upon the wonder of our tongue than the
damage we do by its aid.
I am afraid I shall not have time to tell you very much
more about myself. You may think me an egotistical insect,
and I do not deny I have a good opinion of our race. "Whilst
I am not singular in my behaviour that when I get a good topic
I like to do it justice. Still, as you desire it, I shall give you a
few more particulars regarding fly-economy and ways ; and I
have yet to tell you of the most curious part of our history,
namely, how Nature manufactures her flies.
Have I a heart? Yes, and a pretty big one too. It lies
along my back, and goes on pumping from morning till night,
just as your own does, distributing the blood through my body.
I have no lungs, but everywhere through my frame runs a
curious set of delicate tubes, and into these tubes air passes by
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY. 201
several apertures; so that I breathe all over my body, and,
although somewhat puffed up and airy through this arrangement,
I feel the advantages of its presence in rendering me light for
flying. The work of my muscles is also rendered less tiring.
You would hardly believe how many times I move my wings
in a second. A wonderful man, M. Marey of Paris, held us
captive, and then calculated that our wings in this position
moved 330 times per second, and that they describe a beautiful
figure of 8 in their motions. When I increase the vibrations
of my wings to 352 times per second, I produce a musical
sound which I am informed corresponds to F. And you know
from experience how I can ring the changes on notes when I
buzz. You can distinguish the angry " buzz " from the good-
natured " hum," and the excited sound from the placid easy-
going note. Is there very much difference after all between
"the expression of the emotions" in the man and in the fly?
Of my legs, I need not say much, except to remind you that
my feet consist of hairy pads, not very elegant, I admit, but
enabling me, by aid of their tube-like hairs and the adhesive
cement I can produce, to walk body downwards from, the ceiling
or to run with ease up and down your walls. But this last is a
sore subject with housewives, and I will not pursue it further.
Last of all, what about my development ? Well, I suppose
you know something about my early history. I am not ashamed
to own that I began life as a maggot of some kind or another.
I fancy you would not have recognized me, had you seen me in
the days of my youth, not to speak of those of my infancy.
But, nevertheless, I was worth studying. I had no legs, and I
am ashamed to say I was a voracious youngster, eating almost
everything that came in my way. Amongst the furnishings of
my body in this stage were certain organs called imagined discs,
arranged along the sides of my frame. I took no account of
202 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FLY.
these until I became the chrysalis, or pupa, which means, as you
know, that I left off my voracious habits. Although I had got
rid of many a coat and skin previously to the commencement
of this stage, yet I retained my last covering, and lay quiet and
still within it, just as the moth or butterfly lies motionless in
its cocoon. Now I saw the use of these imaginal discs. Can
you believe it, I seemed to undergo a kind of dissolution, and
to be rebuilt up like a Phoenix from the ruins of my frame ?
These discs became, some of them, the legs I now possess ;
others of them gave rise to my head ; and others again to my
wings. The only part of my infant body which was retained
and used in the production of my present frame was the tail,
which, with a little touching up at the hands of Nature, became
the comely appendage I now possess. Then a day came when
the rebuilt body was complete, and as the old skin of my
childhood was burst and cast aside, I emerged into the world as
Musca domestica the perfect fly. Such a strange history in
my humble opinion is only paralleled by that which ends our
eventful lives and yours, when our elements are once more
dissipated hither and thither to enter, it may be, I am told, into
new combinations in the world of life.
My tale is ended. I hear a familiar "hum" close by, which
warns me that a near friend and neighbour has discovered a
store of sweets of which he kindly invites me to partake. We
must make the most of our time you know. Thank you for the
patient attention you have given to my story. May you cherish
in future none but kindly feelings to the race of flies, and if
you care to know more of our history you will not find your
labour in vain. Though I say it myself, we are a curious set
of beings ; and you see there may be something to wonder at
even in our common acquaintances. This last I consider is a
wise remark, applicable to other lives than those of flies. Fare
you well.
ABOUT KANGABOOS.
THE visitor to our zoological collections naturally pauses a while
before the kangaroo sheds, to remark the curious aspect of
these animals, or even to gaze at beings to whose history
attaches much that is strange and interesting. The mere look
of a kangaroo is, to say the least of it, ungainly and awkward
in the extreme. The animal somewhat resembles the frog in
the extreme development of the hind limbs as compared with the
front members, and when at rest sits in much the same posi-
tion as the amphibian, only differing from the frog or cat in that
its fore limbs are completely free from the ground. Eesting in
its cage the kangaroo sits on a kind of tripod, the two hind
limbs and the strong tail forming the three legs of its support.
Moving about in its den the animal progresses in awkward
fashion, hopping on its two hind limbs, and occasionally assist-
ing its movements by tilting itself over for support upon its
short fore limbs, but invariably coming to rest upon the tripod
once again. The non-zoological visitor to the kangaroos is, as
a rule, perfectly conversant with the fact that they come from
Australia that curious continent which gives us the Ornitho-
rhynchus, or duck-billed water-mole, and other curious creatures.
The animal just mentioned, indeed, is a near neighbour of the
204 ABOUT KANGAROOS.
kangaroos, and presents a strange appearance in that it possesses
a duck-like bill and webbed toes. So curious was its outward
aspect that when first brought to England, about the close of
last century, it was regarded as a manufactured monstrosity,
but more exact examination of the animal served to dissipate
the erroneous impressions, and to establish its position as one
of the lowest quadrupeds. With the opossums which, by the
way, are limited in their range to the New World the kanga-
roos also possess near relationship ; and the wombats, koalas,
Tasmanian devil, and like beings, hail them as kith and kin.
We may learn much, not merely respecting the quadrupeds at
large, but regarding the manner in which the existing popula-
tion of this world has been distributed and arranged, from a
simple study in zoology, such as that we now purpose to under-
take. Let us therefore try, firstly, to gain some ideas regarding
the broad structure of these animals, and concerning the rela-
tions of the kangaroos to their own kith and kin and to the
world which they may especially call their own.
That the kangaroo is a quadruped or mammal, and that it
therefore belongs to the same great class which includes man as
its head, are facts known to every one. But such information,
whilst leading us to expect that between the highest animals
and the kangaroos there should exist certain broad likenesses of
structure and function, also prepares us conversely to expect to
find marked differences between the kangaroos and most other
quadrupeds. It may be said that man and the kangaroo agree
in the broad structure of their bodies. Their bodies, along with
those of all other quadrupeds, conform to a general type or plan
which may be said to run through the whole class of mammals.
But apart from this broad likeness, there are many and impor-
tant differences to be discerned upon a very short acquaintance-
ship with the lower forms ; and to some of these differences and
ABOUT KANGAROOS. 205
your characteristic belongings of the kangaroo tribe we may
now direct attention.
All kangaroos and of the race there are various genera and
many species agree very closely indeed in their general struc-
ture and appearance. It would require no scientific training to
enable an observer to parcel out the kangaroos from all other
quadrupeds. True, there are the " kangaroo rats," belonging
to the kangaroo family, which are, perhaps, strictly speaking
not true kangaroos ; and there are the tree kangaroos of New
Guinea, in which fore and hind limbs are nearly of the same
size, and which possess scaly tails, not used as supports after
the fashion of the common species. But even these animals
might justifiably enough be called " kangaroos," and the natu-
ralist places them in the kangaroo family, to which he gives
the name Macropodidce. The representative family (or generic)
name of the kangaroos is Macropus, a term meaning " large-
footed," and the derivative of which we shall presently note.
The members of the family derive their special names from
some peculiarity of colour, size, or structure. Thus we speak
of one kangaroo as Macropus major, of another as Macropus
rufus, and of a third as Macropus Brunii. This is saying much
the same thing as if Ave were dealing with a race of Smiths,
calling one group the London-Smiths, another the Edinburgh-
Smiths, and a third the Dublin-Smiths. When we come to the
tree kangaroos we speak of them as the Dendrologus, and such
a variation of name implies the difference which we might
regard as existing between our friends the Smiths and the
Smythes. They really spring from the same family tree, but
the variations in personal features and structural history have
necessitated the separation of the tree kangaroos into a distinct
genus or group of the kangaroo family. And similarly with
the kangaroo rats, and with the rock kangaroos, and other
206 ABOUT KANGAROOS.
branches of the family we recognise their relationship to the
kangaroos with which we are so familiar, but we also note their
differences, and make allowance accordingly for their removal
to a little distance from the heads of the house. The only animals
which so closely resemble the kangaroos that they might be
mistaken at first sight for our " long-footed " friends, are the
little creatures named " jerboas," which occur chiefly in Northern
Africa, and which are also represented in North America. These
are little animals allied to the rats and mice, and included in
the group of the Rodents, or " gnawers." When the kangaroos
were first seen, indeed, their likeness to the little jerboas which
likewise sit upon their long hind legs, and leap like the kangaroos
was duly remarked. But the naturalist would point to many
and important differences between jerboas and kangaroos ; these
differences including variations in bones, teeth, brain, and many
other points. Hence the resemblance in question is at the best
but superficial, as also is that between the kangaroos and those
curious little creatures the elephant-shrews of Africa, which
are really little shrew-mice, but which also possess a miniature
proboscis, or elongated nose, and long hind legs like our
Australian animals.
So much for the family resemblances of the kangaroos. A
word or two concerning their discovery may not prove unin-
teresting, if only by way of accounting for the origin of the
name. In 1770 Captain Cook visited Botany Bay in the
Endeavour, which had been despatched in 1768 on a scientific
mission. In the course of the voyage, and when anchored in
Endeavour River, an exploring and foraging party returned to
the ship with the news that they had seen a new and curious
animal, of a mouse colour, and about as large as a greyhound,
which moved with surprising dexterity and swiftness. This
animal was seen next day, on which occasion also one of the
ABOUT KANGAROOS. 207
seamen brought the surprising intelligence that he had seen the
devil! this information relating to an animal which he said
had horns and wings. The animal proved to be minus the
horns (which were, no doubt, its ears) but to possess wings, and
appeared in the shape of a large fruit-eating bat. The new
animal of the mouse-colour and of the size of a greyhound was
duly seen by Captain Cook himself, who remarked its long tail,
and also that it leapt like a hare or deer. On Saturday, July
14th, a Mr. Gore shot one of the new animals, which was ascer-
tained to be called " Kangaroo " by the natives, and which was
likewise proved to be remarkably good eating at the voyagers'
dinner of Sunday, July 15th, 1770. Such was the description
given by Captain Cook of the now well-known "kangaroo."
Antiquarian researches in zoology, however, inform us that
De Bruins, a Dutch traveller, saw a kangaroo as early as 1711.
This animal was kept domesticated at Batavia, was named
" Filander," and appears to be the species now called Macropus
Brunii, after its discoverer.
The kangaroo's personal characters are both easy and in-
teresting of study. The great length of the hind limbs as
compared with the fore limbs has already been remarked, and
the resemblance between the human arm and the kangaroo's
fore limb is very close, inasmuch as both possess five fingers.
The hind limb, however, is provided with a different number
and a widely varied arrangement of its toes. The name " long-
footed " applied to the animal is fully deserved, since the bones
of the instep are exceedingly long, and upon this lengthened
part of the foot the animal chiefly rests. But more noticeable
are the toes. These number four in all, but two of the four
toes appear to compose the really useful part of the foot. Of
these two big toes the inner one is by far the larger, and is
provided with a large claw or nail. On the inner side of this
208 ABOUT KANGAROOS.
large toe in turn we find two other and extremely small toes,
which are bound together in one fold of skin, and which clearly
represent the second and third toes in man's foot. So that a
kangaroo possesses all the toes we see in man, with the excep-
tion of the first or great toe, which is completely absent. This
foot the animal uses as a means of defence, frequently killing
dogs with a single blow. One of the most remarkable features
regarding the kangaroos and their neighbours consists in this
disposition dfc their toes. It is somewhat surprising when we
think of it, that in the foot of a kangaroo used for leaping, in
that of its neighbour, the koala, used for climbing, and in that
of the ground-living bandicoot, we should find essentially the
same composition of foot. This resemblance and conformity to
one type, beneath varied uses and ways of life, can only be
reasonably explained by the theory that these varied beings are
descended from a common ancestor, and this theory, as we shall
see, is supported by other facts of kangaroo existence.
Not the least interesting part of kangaroo history is in-
cluded in the details which relate to the early life of these
animals. Born in a weakly state, the young, as every one
knows, are carried and protected within the pouch, or marsu-
pium, of the mother for a considerable period after birth. We
know that the young of a kangaroo, which stands over six feet
high when full grown, are about an inch long at birth, and hence
we perceive the necessity for their protection until they are of
an age to shift for themselves. The young are transferred to the
pouch, and are there duly protected and fed by means of the
milk secretion of the parent. Even the throat of the young is
so constructed that in its early and feeble condition it can
obtain its nourishment without incurring any danger of suffoca-
tion; and we may perceive in this latter fact an evidence of
that complete adaptation to a singular manner of life which is
ABOUT KANGAROOS. 209
so frequently demonstrated by the studies of the naturalist.
The " pouch " in which the young are protected is supported
upon a couple of bones, which may be said to be peculiar to the
kangaroos and their neighbours. These bones arise from the
brim of the haunch-bones, and in their .nature they may be
regarded as essentially differing from the true skeleton. They
represent parts which in other animals exist as the tendons or
sinews of certain of the muscles in front of the body. The
observation that the bones of the " pouch " are merely altered
sinews, again presents to our notice the consideration that nature
has adapted these animals for their peculiar life, not by the
development of new structures and parts, but by the modifica-
tion of parts which are common to all animals. It is noteworthy
that an adaptation somewhat similar to that seen in the pouch
of the kangaroos and their neighbours is seen in those curious
little fishes common in our aquaria, and known as Hippocampi,
or " Sea-horses." The males of these fishes possess a pouch, in
which the eggs are not merely contained, but in which the
young are also thereafter protected. The most curious feature
of this latter relationship betwixt parent and young, however,
consists in the fact that it is the male fishes which tend and
nurse the progeny thus reversing the common rule of animal
existence.
The internal anatomy of the kangaroo presents many points
of extreme interest to the zoologist and anatomist, but which
may be but lightly touched upon, if mentioned at all within
the limits of a popular article. Thus the lower jaw of the
kangaroo and its neighbours is bent inwards, or " inflected," as
the technical term runs, at its lower and hinder portion, such a
peculiarity being of high importance as a character of the group.
The kangaroo is well provided in the matter of teeth, and these
organs are adapted in turn for their work of cropping and
p
210 ABOUT KANGAROOS.
bruising the grasses and other vegetable matters upon which
the animals feed. There are six front or cutting teeth above,
and two cutting teeth below; the latter pointing straight
forwards. No "eye-teeth" exist in the kangaroos, but five
grinders are seen in each half of the upper jaw, and the same
number exists in the lower jaw behind. Thus, these animals
are provided with twenty-eight teeth, being only four less than
man. The true, or American opossums not to be confounded
with the " opossums " of the Australian colonist, which latter
are merely species of phalangers possess on the other hand
almost double the number of teeth found in our kangaroos.
In some of the opossums fifty teeth are found, and they are
perhaps most notable as possessing a larger number of cutting
or front teeth than any other animals. In some of the opossums,
it may be likewise mentioned, the " pouch " is represented by
a mere fold of skin, useless for protecting the young, whilst the
bones of the pouch, however, are well developed. In such a
case, the opossum's habits fully compensate for the want of her
probable nursery, in that the young are carried on the mother's
back, and obtain a secure lodgment thereon by twisting their
tails around hers.
Concluding thus the personal history of the kangaroo, we
may briefly glance at the characters of the " order " of animals
to which it belongs, by way of introduction to the past history
of the kangaroo race. These animals agree with the opossums
of America, and with the bandicoots, koalas, and other Australian
animals, in possessing the pouch with its characteristic bones,
and in the possession of the " inflected " jaw just alluded to, as
their principal characters. Accordingly the naturalist classifies
all of these animals to form a single " order," called the " Mar-
supialia," or that of the "pouched" quadrupeds, which has
Australia as its head-quarters, and which possesses but one single
ABOUT KANGAROOS. 211
family outside the boundaries of that island-continent namely,
the opossums of America. Now, it may be fairly enough asked,
have we any record in history to show how Australia came to
be the home of marsupial quadrupeds ; how the opossums came
to settle down in America, and far apart from their only kith
and kin in Australia ; and how marsupials are absent from all
other parts of this world's surface ? Without presuming to
overrate the importance of our present study, we may safely
say that the answers to such questions deal with some of the
most important phenomena in the past history of our globe, and
bring us, through a simple study such as ours, within the grasp
of a deep philosophy. Let us once again briefly consider the
problem before us. We are dealing with the case of a peculiar
order of quadrupeds, named " marsupials," from their possessing
a " pouch ; " we find these to be confined to Australia, with the
exception of a single family, the opossums which occur in
America. On what theory may we explain satisfactorily, two
facts firstly, the limitation of the kangaroos and their neigh-
bours to Australia, and secondly, the exceptional nature of the
home of their opossum-friends in the New World ?
To answer these important queries, we must pass firstly to
the province of geology and to the history of fossils. The natura-
list takes leave of us for the present by reminding us that the
marsupials are lower quadrupeds than our cows, horses, dogs,
cats, and ordinary animals ; and he also begs to remind us that
when Australia was first colonized, no other or higher quadrupeds
save perhaps a bat or two were found there. The sheep,
cattle, horses, dogs, and other familiar animals now found
abundantly in Australia, are all importations, and not native
products. So that we begin by esteeming our kangaroos and
their neighbours as mammals of a low type in truth, but
nevertheless as representing in their way the original quad-
212 ABOUT KANGAROOS.
ruped population of Australia. Geology now takes up the
thread of the story. Australia, it tells us, is as practically
distinct in its animals to-day as it was of old. A little channel,
called the Straits of Lombok fifteen miles wide, but a channel
of deep water divides the Indian Eegion, as we term it, (con-
sisting of so much of the Malay Archipelago, with its monkeys,
its rhinoceroses, its tigers, etc.), from the Australian Region, in
which, as we have seen, monkeys are unknown and higher
quadrupeds totally wanting as native animals. The geologist
continues his tale, and shows us that the lowest quadrupeds are
older than the higher ones, and that the marsupial animals
occur as fossils long before our familiar quadrupeds were in
existence. The marsupials and their neighbours were, in fact,
the first quadrupeds to appear on the earth's surface; the higher
animals being children of a later growth.
Next in order, the geologist tells us that the first traces of
marsupial life appear as fossils in those rocks which are called
the Trias, and which are much older than the far-back Chalk
Rocks themselves. Indeed, in the Stonesfield Slates lying above
the Trias, we find the remains of a marsupial which must have
been remarkably like the little banded ant-eater alive in
Australia to-day. But far more important than all else is the
information which next comes to hand, namely, that we find the
fossils of marsupials in Europe and America, thus proving that
in the Triassic and succeeding period they had, if not a world-
wide distribution, at least a very extensive range over the earth's
surface as it then existed. In these words we have emphasized
lies the key to the mysteries and curiosities of marsupial distri-
bution to-day. In Australia we do not find the fossil remains
of any other quadrupeds save marsupials, thus proving that no
other mammals save those allied to its existing population have
ever been tenants therein. We do find in Australia, however,
ABOUT KANGAROOS. 213
the fossil remains of kangaroos, and like animals, differing from
their living neighbours in their immense size. Think of a
kangaroo whose head alone was about three feet long, and you
may conceive of the race of marsupial giants which inhabited
Australia in geologically "recent" times, and of which our
kangaroos and their neighbours are the pigmy descendants.
In the Triassic period, then, and in the Oolite, a succeeding
epoch, it is certain that marsupials and their allies were the only
quadrupeds developed on the face of the earth, and that they
overran the world's surface ; representing in their way the varied
quadrupeds of to-day, and leaving here and there the fossil relics
from which the "coming race" of mankind would construct
their history. We see Australia then joined to what we now
name the Asiatic Continent obtaining its marsupial population
like the rest of the world. Next we perceive Australia to become
detached from Asia, its marsupials being thus cut off from all
subsequent communication with their neighbours elsewhere.
Soon the higher quadrupeds begin to appear however, and the
marsupials, which had hitherto held undisputed sway of the
world's surface, come off defeated in the " struggle for existence."
The higher and stronger quadrupeds come to possess the earth,
and the wasted marsupials, well-nigh killed off in all parts of
the world save Australia, at length die out entirely, with the
exception of the nimble opossums, which, finding originally a
safe home and haven in the New World, have lived and nourished
there, since after the close of the Eocene period, when their
reign in Europe came to an end. To the question, then, why
kangaroos are only found alive in Australia ? we reply, because,
on account of the early severance of Australia from other lands,
they have there been free from the inroads of higher and
stronger animals. To the query, why are the opossums, of all
marsupials, found in America alone ? we answer, because they
214 ABOUT KANGAROOS.
represent the surviving remnant of the marsupial population
which once overspread the whole earth, but which died out in
Europe at the beginning of the Tertiary period, and which now
flourishes (as the opossum family) ; in America, since the
" struggle for existence " has not been too hard for the welfare
of their race. The opossums apparently did not migrate to
Australia in the Triassic period to form part of the original stock
from which our kangaroos and their allies are derived, and
probably they represent a later development and a highly
modified race of the marsupial group.
Thus, when we next look at our marsupials, we may in our
mind's eye once again see the world peopled by that curious
race of beings ; once again we may see the conifers, tree-ferns,
and cycads growing around us, as in the days of the Triassic
and Oolitic worlds; once again we behold the spine-bearing
fishes and the Port Jackson sharks in our seas ; and thus in
field and forest, lake and sea, the scientific imagination pictures
for us series after series of strange forms succeeding each other
in the "files of time," filling our earth with the curious array of
quadruped life, at the head of which stands the last creation
Man, and at the base of which dwells our friend the Kangaroo.
ON GIANTS.
FROM the earliest times, man has taken a deep interest in the
marvellous, and especially in that aspect which relates to the
production of abnormal beings of his own kind. Eeferences in
ancient literature to the existence of giants and dwarfs are by
no means rare, and even in the records of the sacred historians
we find mention made of beings of abnormal stature, since we
are informed that " there were giants in the earth " in patri-
archal times. Henrion, a Member of the French Academy of
Sciences, published in 1718 a work in which he argued for the
great decrease in stature and physical conformation generally
which had taken place in the human race between the Creation
and the advent of the Christian era. In this curious treatise,
the learned, but somewhat credulous, author informs us that
Adam was 123 feet 9 inches in height, whilst Eve's stature is
asserted to have been 118 feet 9 inches and 9 lines. The ex-
actitude of the Academician's calculations forms a noticeable
point in the recital ; whilst no less remarkable is his assertion
of the inexplicable degeneracy which the race seems to have
undergone within a comparatively short period. Noah, we are
told, attained a height of only twenty-seven feet; Abraham
was barely twenty feet in stature ; whilst Moses is alleged to
have measured only thirteen feet in height. Henrion takes
216 ON GIANTS.
care to add that in his opinion the advent of the Christian era
prevented the continuous decrease which had hitherto prevailed,
and records his thankfulness that humanity was not permitted
to become represented by infinitesimal or microscopic specks.
The ancient and mediaeval accounts of human giants are inter-
mingled with much that is problematic, and in some cases
absolutely fabulous. We are assured, however, that the height
of Funnam, a Scotch giant who lived in the time of Pope
Eugene II. this pontiffs death having occurred in the year
827 was eleven feet ; whilst in 1509 there were discovered at
Rouen the remains of the Chevalier Rin9on, whose skull was
alleged to have been capable of holding a bushel of wheat,
whilst the length of his shin-bone is stated at four feet. In
1705, the skeleton of a hero named Bucart was disinterred at
Valence, the remains measuring some twenty-two feet in length.
These cases of huge development may very appropriately be
capped by the Sicilian story of a human skeleton which was
gravely maintained to measure three hundred feet in length ;
whilst, with the apparent object of giving additional veracity to
the recital, this giant's walking-stick was alleged to have also
been found, the length of this appendage being given at thirty
feet.
We must naturally allow much for the credulity of the age
in which these and similar instances of humaii giants were not
only related, but also believed in. But again we find that
ignorance of natural objects, and the then infantile stage of
natural science, may together be credited with inducing an
implicit faith in such legends. Sir Hans Sloane, of British
Museum celebrity, was one of the first to express his opinion
that the remains described as those of human beings of im-
mense stature, were not those of men, but of some huge extinct
animals; Sir Hans' ideas being met, in the spirit of the age,
ON GIANTS. 217
with a fierce opposition of a pseudo-religious kind. He was
charged, through the expression of his opinions, with impugn-
ing the authenticity of the Scriptures, and with heresies of
like kind. But those who thus had their beliefs " nail'd wi '
Scriptur'" were rather disconcerted a little later by the an-
nouncement that Cuvier, through the exercise of his talents in
the investigation of fossil remains, had declared the remains
of the supposed human giants to be those of extinct animals,
which were no doubt also giants in their way, especially when
compared with their existing representatives. Thus fossil
sloths and elephants of large size had been doing duty for
giants of the human race; and the teeth of human giants,
which used to be so conspicuously displayed in museums, were
relegated to their proper sphere under the description of the
armature of elephant's jaws.
The consideration of some of the best-authenticated cases of
mankind having attained in modern times a very large stature,
may be fitly prefaced by a brief account of several groups of
lower animals in which individuals are known to occasionally
exhibit gigantic proportions, since such a study of comparative
development will assist us in obtaining some clear ideas regard-
ing the prevalence of giants in lower life. In some of the
lowest groups of the animal series, giant species, or members of
species which are ordinarily of small size, may sometimes be
developed. Most readers know something of the zoophytes
those curious plant-like animals, which are so frequently cast
up on our shores, and which may be obtained in great quanti-
ties by dredging all round our coasts. These organisms ordi-
narily measure a few inches in length, but certainly the largest
of them must shrink into insignificance when compared with
the giant zoophyte obtained by the dredge of the Challenger
off the coast of Japan, and again off Honolulu. This organism
2 IS ON GIANTS.
measures seven feet four inches in height, its stem has a dia-
meter of half an inch, and the mouths and tentacles of some of
its included animals measure nine inches across. This truly is
an example of a veritable giant-race ; and it forms not the least
curious feature of such a being to consider that we are thus
presented with an example of a literal zoological tree, consisting
of numerous animal forms, which, however, unlike the vast
majority of their neighbours, grow up in the strange similitude
of a plant.
Passing by, with a mere mention, the instances of some
giant sea-worms, some of which such as the Nemertes of the
zoologist may attain a length of forty feet or more, we may
note certain extraordinary and instructive cases of large develop-
ments amongst molluscous animals. Shells may vary greatly
in size, as the visitor to any large museum may observe, but
probably the largest known shells are those of the Giant Clams
(Tridacna gigantea) of the Indian Ocean, the shells of which
may measure a yard and a half in length, and weigh 500 Ibs.
The contained animal may attain a weight of 20 Ibs., and forms
a description of oyster of tough but palatable kind. In the
church of St. Sulpice at Paris, large specimens of these shells
are to be seen, the valves being used for fonts. Unquestionably,
however, the cuttlefishes constitute a group, around which our
interest must centre in regard to the huge development of
many of these forms, and to the curious historical and legendary
aspects with which the question has become invested. The
student of classical lore will be at no loss for instances of giant
developments of cuttlefishes, since Pliny and other writers give
full accounts of some monsters which were alleged to exist in
these early days, and to cause fear and terror to reign supreme
in more than one maritime state. Pliny, in his Natural History,
relates the history of one " polypus," or cuttlefish, which ex-
ON- CIA NTS. 219
hibited a singular liking for salted tunnies, since it was said
to emerge at night from the sea, and carry off its booty from
the curers' stores. Another cuttlefish is described as having
haunted the coasts of Spain, and devastated the fisheries. This
creature was finally captured, and, as the incident is told by
Pliny, the body weighed 700 Ibs., the arms surrounding the
head measuring ten yards in length. ^Elian, whose period
dates from A.D. 220 to 250, relates the history of a cuttle, which
resembled Pliny's monster in its affinity for cured fish, since it
also made raids on the fish-curers' stores, and obtained its booty
by crushing the barrels in which the preserved meats were
contained.
The naturalists of the Pienaissance were certainly not behind
their classic predecessors in their recitals of giant cuttlefishes,
and it becomes exceedingly difficult, or even impossible, to
separate out the real from the fabulous in dealing with the
records of some of the mediaeval writers. The legends of
Northern Europe, for example, have long credited the Northern
Seas with affording refuge to a large monster of cuttlefish-
nature, to which the name of the " Kraken " has been applied.
A worthy but credulous ecclesiastic, Eric Pontoppidan by name,
and Bishop of Bergen by office, propagated no doubt with the
best intentions, and with a firm belief in his recitals many
astonishing ideas and theories regarding the existence of the
Kraken. In his "Natural History of Norway," published
about 1754, he tells us that this Kraken was " liker an island
than a beast," and suggests that the appearance of the animal,
as it lay almost submerged in the water, lured unwary mariners
to a dreadful fate ; these persons landing to be submerged on a
moving mass instead of standing on a firm island.
Another writer and churchman, Olaus Magnus, in his
" Historia de Genlibus Septentrionalibus," dating from 1555,
220 ON GIANTS.
also relates many curious tales of the Krakeii and other gigantic
forms ; and in the case of the latter writer, it is even more
difficult than in the study of Pontoppidan's works to separate
facts from fiction.
But of all the mediaeval writers who drew largely upon
imagination, Denys de Montfort was probably the most notable.
This writer had infinitely less excuse than his contemporaries
for perpetuating errors, since he was one of the assistants in the
Natural History Museum of Paris, and thus claimed title to
possess scientific knowledge and accuracy. Notwithstanding
his scientific pretensions, however, De Montfort, in his " Histoire
Naturelle Generale et Particuliere des Mollusques," propagated
many ideas of erroneous, not to say ludicrous, kind, regarding
the occurrence and power of giant cuttlefishes. Thus, he boldly
asserts the existence of a giant " poulpe " or octopus, which, as
demonstrated by a most sensational engraving, he alleged to be
capable of destroying ships wholesale, by dragging them beneath
the waves with its arms. A three-masted barque of consider-
able dimensions is thus represented as being devastated by a
" poulpe " of giant size, although it is related that the crew
managed to escape destruction by severing the monster's arms
with hatchets. Nor was De Montfort contented with this
endeavour to deceive his readers. Report says that this worthy
declared his , intention to make the poulpe destroy a whole
fleet, if the story of his one entangled ship was accepted ; and
report appears to have spoken truly in this instance, since, in
the second volume of the work referred to, he informs his
readers that six French men-of-war, captured by Admiral
Rodney on the 12th of April, 1782, were engulfed by giant
cuttlefishes, along with four British ships which acted as convoy
to the prizes. The actual facts of the latter incident, as officially
recorded, show De Montfort's assertions to be utterly false.
ON GIANTS, 221
The six prizes arrived safely at Jamaica, but on their subse-
quent voyage to England were greatly damaged by a violent
storm, in which it is needless to remark the " colossal poulpes "
of De Montfort played no part.
As a last example of a tale of giant cuttlefishes, in which
elements of discrepancy and exaggeration are plainly discernible,
we may select the recital alleged by De Montfort to have been
obtained from the lips of Captain Jean Magnus Dens, a worthy
navigator who hailed from Dunkirk, and who made voyages to
the Chinese Seas. Being becalmed on one occasion in mid-
ocean, Captain Dens, like an energetic master mariner, set his
crew to work to scrape and paint the sides of his ship. During
the performance of this operation, a giant cuttlefish was alleged
to have risen from the depths close to the side of the vessel,
and to have carried off two of the sailors, whilst it seized a
third with one of its arms ; the startled crew, however, by aid
of hatchets and prayers to St. Thomas, their tutelary saint,
succeeded in releasing their comrade by cutting off the intrud-
ing member. The length of the arm thus severed, is stated by
De Montfort at twenty-five feet, whilst its thickness is said to
have equalled, that of Dens' mizen yard, its suckers being as
big as saucepan lids. Probably Dens did actually encounter a
cuttlefish, and it is possible he may have engaged in battle
with it.
It is fortunate that in scientific records, written or compiled
by men whose character as observers and as faithful recorders of
what they saw is above suspicion, we possess evidence to show
that giants of the cuttlefish race do unquestionably occur in
various seas ; whilst, as will presently be related, the examina-
tion, within the few past years, of the remains of several huge
cuttlefish-forms has placed their occurrence within the domain
of sober zoological fact. For example, Peron, a celebrated
222 ON GIANTS.
French naturalist and explorer, relates, in his " Voyage of Dis-
covery," that he saw in the year 1801, off Van Diemen's Land,
a cuttlefish which possessed a body of the size of a barrel ; the
length of the arms being estimated at six or seven feet, and
their largest diameter at six or seven inches. Quoy and
Gaimard, whose reputation as observers and travellers of a past
generation is world-wide, assert that in the Atlantic they fell in
with the mutilated remains of a gigantic squid or calamary a
kind of cuttlefish represented in our own seas by specimens
attaining a maximum length of 1| feet or so the original
weight of this specimen being roughly estimated at 200 Ibs.
The learned Professor Steenstrup, of Copenhagen, relates that
many years ago a large calamary was cast upon the Danish
coast, the length of this specimen being set down at twenty-one
feet, the tentacles adding an additional eighteen feet to the
latter measurement. In 1854 Steenstrup met with a second
case of like kind in the shape of a large cuttle which was thrown
ashore on the coast of Jutland ; the length of this specimen
being at least fully equal to that of the previous instance.
A singular and interesting incident in the voyage of the
French war-steamer Alecton was afforded by the discovery,
on the 30th of November, 1861, of a giant calamary, between
Madeira and Teneriffe. The body of this specimen was said to
attain a length of sixteen or seventeen feet, minus the arms.
The animal was met with floating listlessly on the surface of the
sea, and, as became a gallant sailor, Commander Bouyer, of the
Alecton, gave the cephalopod battle. The harpoons, however,
tore through the soft flesh of the animal, whilst the bullets fired
at it simply imbedded themselves in the mass without doing
much apparent damage to the creature. The crew of the
Alecton succeeded in passing a noose around the tail-fin of the
monster this fin being shaped somewhat like an arrow-head
ON GIANTS. 223
so that the rope was firmly retained by the fin, and considerable
pressure could be thus made on the animal's body by pulling at
the rope. Unfortunately, the softness of the body, together
with its dead weight, defeated the intentions of the crew ; for
they succeeded in pulling on board the tail-fin and tip of the
body, leaving the maimed giant, minus his tail, to disappear in
the deep. The portion thus captured weighed about 40 Ibs.,
and the French consul at Teneriffe, in his report of the matter
sent to the French Academy of Sciences, relates that he in-
spected the captured portion two days after the occurrence.
Some of the most interesting cases in which huge cephalo-
pods have been met with, however, are recorded in the narratives
of British science. On the 25th of April, 1875, a large cuttle-
fish was met with basking on the surface of the sea of Boffin
Island, Connemara, by the crew of a " corragh " this latter
being a boat constructed of hoops and tarred canvas, and some-
what resembling the " coracle " of early days. The fishermen,
knowing the value of cuttle-fish bait, attacked the animal, and,
after a hard chase, lopped off several arms, together with the
head, the body being allowed to sink. It is due to the intelli-
gence and care of Sergeant O'Connor, of the Eoyal Irish Con-
stabulary, that portions of the tentacles and the beak were
transmitted to Dublin for preservation in the museum of the
Royal Dublin Society, and from the description of these
valuable relics by Mr. More, assistant naturalist in the above
museum, we extract the following particulars. This specimen,
like all other species of squids, had ten arms, two of these,
named tentacles, being very much longer than the others, and
possessing suckers at their extremities only. " A good part of
both tentacles, one short arm, and the great beak entire," says
Mr. More, " have reached Dublin, and there remains very little
doubt that we have now to deal with a second example of the
224 ON GIANTS.
famous Architeuthis dux of Steenstrup ; " this latter being the
appellation that the Danish naturalist gave to the specimen
which, as already remarked, was cast ashore on Jutland in 1854.
The following particulars are given of the dimensions of the
Irish specimen : " Tentacles thirty feet long when fresh
(fourteen and seventeen feet can still be made up from the
pickled pieces). A few distant, small, and nearly sessile (un-
stalked) suckers occur at long intervals along the inner surface
of the peduncle," or stalk of the tentacle. The expanded
termination of the suckers, "measuring 2 feet 9 inches in
its present shrunken state, is occupied in the centre of the
palm by two rows of large stalked suckers nearly one inch in
diameter, fourteen in each row ; an alternating row of fourteen
smaller suckers (half an inch in diameter) occupies the margin
on each side of the palm. . . . These outer suckers are each
armed with a denticulated (or toothed) bony ring of some
twenty-eight teeth, pointing inwards. . . . The short arm is
quite spoiled for examination ; all the horny rings are gone, and
the suckers themselves are scarcely represented. This arm
measured eight feet in length, and fifteen inches round the base
when fresh. The beak has a strong, wide tooth about the
middle of the edge of the inner mandible (or jaw), and a much
narrower notch on the outer mandible on each side. The head
and eyes were unfortunately lost." We have thus sufficient
details afforded even by the imperfect and cursory examination
of these remains, to assure us that a cuttlefish, which might
well be termed a veritable giant of its kind, when compared
with its ordinary neighbours, was actually captured and de-
spoiled. At Dingle, in Kerry, some 200 years ago, a gigantic
cuttlefish was stranded. This latter is described as having
been nineteen feet in total length, whilst the size of the animal
is stated to have equalled that of a large horse.
ON GIANTS. 225
In October, 1873, two fishermen met with a large cuttlefish
which was floating quietly near the eastern extremity of Belle
Isle, Conception Bay, about nine miles from St. John's, New-
foundland. Thinking the floating mass was the remains of a
wreck, the men grappled it with a boothook, the formerly inert
mass at once waking up into life, and appearing as a huge
cuttlefish, which threw its two long arms across the boat, these
arms, however, being at once severed with an axe. The animal
then moved off into deep water, ejecting in its retreat a quantity
of the inky fluid which these creatures elaborate by way of a
protective secretion, capable of being quickly diffused in the
surrounding water, and of thus serving as a cloak of darkness
under which escape may be effected. A portion of one of the
amputated arms is preserved in the museum at St. John's ; and
Professor Verrill, of Yale College, U.S., estimates, as approximate
and comparative measurements, the length of the body at ten
feet, its diameter at 2 feet 5 inches, whilst the length of
the long tentacles is set down at thirty-two feet, and that of the
head at two feet. Another specimen was captured in Logic
Bay, Newfoundland, in November, 1874, a photograph of the
head and arms having been taken of this cuttlefish. From the
representation of this cuttlefish we may gain an idea of its
gigantic size; and the actual measurements fully confirm the
opinion formed regarding its great dimensions. The body ex-
ceeded seven feet in length, the tail-fin was twenty-two inches
broad, the two long tentacles were each twenty-four feet in
length, the eight short arms were each six feet long and ten
inches in circumference at the base ; whilst the number of
suckers was computed at 1100, and the great eyes measured
four inches in diameter. Professor Verrill has also given details
of the stranding of another giant of this class at Grand Bank,
Fortune Bay, Newfoundland, in December, 1874, this locality
226 ON GIANTS.
beiug apparently specially favoured iii respect of its cuttlefish
visitors : the abundance of cod and other fishes adapted for
cuttlefish dietary affording a ready explanation of the latter
fact. The total length of this last visitor to the Newfoundland
shores is given at forty feet; the long arms making about
twenty-six feet of this measurement, whilst the largest suckers
were about one inch in diameter.
It would thus appear to be not only a settled fact that
cuttlefish giants are actually developed, but that these monsters
belong to new and distinct species, and may therefore be re-
garded, in the opinion of many naturalists, as presenting us with
literal races of giants.
From the cuttlefishes to the true fishes is a transition of an
easy nature both in a popular and in a zoological sense.
Amongst the fishes very large individuals are developed in a
normal and' natural fashion such dimensions as twenty or even
thirty feet in length being common in many sharks. But with
other groups of fishes, gigantic individuals belonging to species
the members of which are ordinarily of small dimensions are
frequently developed, these latter instances being typical cases
of giants arising from amongst their normal-sized brethren. For
example, amongst the flat fishes specimens of very large size are
by no means of unfrequent occurrence. The turbot, possessing
an average weight of 6 or 7 Ibs., has been known to weigh
70 Ibs., whilst the halibut, which attains an ordinary length of
four or five feet, has been found to measure seven feet in length.
A specimen of this fish was captured on the coast of Caithness
in February, 1877, which measured 7 feet in length, 3* feet in
breadth, and 1 foot in thickness, its weight being 231 Ibs. Even
the familiar cod may attain very large proportions. At Lochiel
Head, on the west coast of Scotland, says a correspondent of the
Oban Times (dating about 1876), a large cod was recently
ON GIANTS. 227
captured, the length of the fish being 9 feet 2 inches, and its
circumference 3 feet 21 inches. One can well understand the
truth of the remark appended to the statement, that some of
the oldest fishermen declared that they had never seen such a
monster taken before. The conger eels may sometimes be de-
veloped to a size in which they approach the dimensions of very
large snakes, whilst those elongated fishes, the " tape " or
" ribbon fishes," attain a normal length of ten, eleven, or even
thirteen feet : and the writer has recently put on record a case
in which a specimen attained the enormous length of sixty feet.
Reptiles frequently attain large dimensions, but more com-
monly as a result of normal growth than of spontaneous and
unusual development ; and some extinct birds, such as the
Dinornis of New Zealand, must have exceeded their neighbours
in size to as great an extent as the reported human giants of
old overtopped their nearest relations. This is particularly the
case with one species of Dinornis, the leg bones of which, found
in a fossil state, are described by Owen as being equal to those
of the elephant in size, whilst the total height of the bird must
have exceeded ten feet. Extinct species of sloths and armadillos
bear a similar relation to their living neighbours. The Irish elk
of recent deposits overtops the stateliest living deer; and the
extinct mammoth, in respect of its size and bulk, might fairly
rank first amongst the elephant kind.
Man, as the head of the animal series, presents us with not
a few interesting examples of large or even extraordinary phy-
sical development, whilst the subject of human overgrowth
assumes an additional interest in the light of an inquiry into
the peculiarities of character which attach themselves to rarities
in the shape of giants of the human race. Of such tall persons
it is noticeable that by far the greater number belong to the
male sex. Giantesses, in fact, are but rarely met with in pro-
228 ON GIANTS.
portion to the number of giants of whom due record has been
preserved. In the reign of Edward III., Long More, or Mores,
an Irish giant, attained the height of 6 feet 10J inches. Queen
Elizabeth had a Flemish porter who attained the height of 7
feet 6 inches ; this height being exceeded by John Middleton,
or the " Child of Hale," as he was called, who was born in 1578,
and who measured 9 feet 3 inches. C. Munster, a yeoman of
the Hanoverian Guard, who died in 1676, attained a height of
8 feet 6 inches ; Cajanus, the Swedish giant, who was exhibited
in London in 1742, attained a height of nine feet. The most
celebrated of living giants are the famous Captain Bates, a
native of Kentucky, who attains a height of eight feet ; his
wife, nee Miss Anna Swan, who was born in Nova Scotia, also
measuring eight feet in height. Many of our readers will
remember the exhibition of the two latter persons a few years
ago in London. Chang-wu-gon, the Chinese giant, is also still
alive ; this tall Celestial measures 7 feet 9 inches in stature.
The details of giant-life exhibit many curious features,
Contrary to expectation, and against the spirit of the old
legends, our modern giants are, for the most part, persons of a
singularly mild disposition, and exhibit, as a rule, the most
amiable of tempers. Nature in this respect, indeed, appears to
preserve a wonderful and admirable balance of power in im-
buing persons of great physical development with an equable
temperament ; whilst the dwarfs and pigmies of our race are
usually inclined to exhibit a disposition the reverse of benevo-
lent or mild. Probably the only giants of past days concerning
whom details of a thoroughly authentic character have been
preserved are Patrick Cotter, alias Patrick Cotter O'Brien, and
Charles Byrne, both individuals hailing from the sister island.
Curiously enough,' there is preserved in the museum of Trinity
College, Dublin, the ^skeleton of a third Irishman, named
ON GIANTS. 229
Magratb, whose case attained some notoriety in consequence of
a Doctor Campbell's statement, in his work entitled " A Philo-
sophical Survey of Ireland," that Magrath's growth was caused
by Bishop Berkeley's experiment of feeding the lad. There
exists little or no foundation for this statement, which probably
arose from the fact that Magrath, having at the age of sixteen
attained a stature of over six feet, and being poorly fed, pre-
sented a fit case for the exercise of the kindly bishop's charity.
He accordingly caused Magrath to receive a liberal diet for
about a month, this treatment restoring the overgrown lad to
health. At his death Magrath measured 7 feet 8 inches.
In the British Magazine for 1783, the death of Charles
Byrne, one of the giants just mentioned, is duly chronicled.
From this source we learn that Byrne measured exactly eight
feet in height in August, 1780 ; whilst " in 1782 his stature had
gained two inches, and when dead his full length was 8 feet 4
inches." His death, sad to relate, is alleged to have been caused
by excessive drinking, " to which," says the writer in the
British Magazine, " he was always addicted, but more particu-
larly since his late loss of all his property, which he had simply
invested in a single bank-note of 700. In his last moments,"
continues the narrator, " he requested that his remains might
be thrown into the sea, in order that his bones might be removed
far out of the reach of the chirurgical fraternity ; in consequence
of which," we are further informed, " the body was put on
board a vessel, conveyed to the Downs, and sunk in twenty
fathoms water." Byrne died, it is necessary to add, in Cockspur
Street, Charing Cross, at the age of twenty-two. The statement
that the remains of the giant were buried at sea is quite
erroneous, since, after all, the " chirurgical fraternity," repre-
sented by the famous John Hunter, contrived, after much
trouble and the expenditure of a considerable sum of money
230 ON GIANTS.
stated at 500 to obtain possession of the body, and the
visitor to the magnificent Museum in Lincoln's-inn-Fields may
have the pleasure of beholding the skeleton of the once famous
Byrne occupying a place of honour in the osteological depart-
ment. It is interesting to note that Byrne appeared on the
stage in 1782, at the Haymarket Theatre, in the summer pan-
tomime of " Harlequin Teague, or the Giant's Causeway " a
title strongly suggestive of Byrne's prominence in the pro-
duction.
The history of Patrick Cotter, who was born at Kinsale in
1761, shows that giants are by no means exempted from the
cares and worries which beset ordinary existence. His parents
were poor persons, of ordinary stature ; and his father leased
him for exhibition to a showman at eighteen years of age, for a
period of three years, at the rate of 50 per annum. Arriving
at Bristol, Cotter demanded some extra remuneration for him-
self; and the showman being disinclined to grant his request,
Cotter refused to allow himself to be exhibited, with the result
of being incarcerated as a debtor. His case, however, being
made known to some benevolent person, Cotter was liberated, by
the contract between his father and the showman being declared
to be illegal ; and, proceeding thereafter to exhibit on his own
account, he realised the sum of 30 in three days.
Cotter adopted the name of O'Brien in order to strengthen
the fiction, set forth in the bills, that he was " a lineal descend-
ant of the old puissant King Brien Boreau," and that he pos-
sessed, " in person and appearance, all the similitude of that
great and grand potentate." His height was stated at " near
nine feet," although a memorial tablet in the Trenchard Street'
Koman Catholic Chapel, Bristol, informs us more truly that his
stature only exceeded "8 feet 3 inches." Cotter died at
Clifton on September 8, 1804, having realised a modest com-
ON GIANTS. 231
petence by exhibiting himself, and having secured, we are told,
the respect of the entire community by his well-regulated con^
duct. Like his countryman Byrne, Cotter was exceedingly
anxious that his remains should not fall into the hands of the
anatomists, and gave directions that his grave should be built
in with bricks and secured with iron bars.
At the end of March, 1877, there died, at the age of forty-
nine years, at the Five Arrows, Waddesdon, near Aylesbury,
the " Buckinghamshire Giant," a person named William
Stevens, who merited his appellation of giant rather from his
immense weight than from his unusual stature. He went to
reside at this tavern some four years before, at which time he
weighed eighteen stones. From that time his life was spent in.
eating and drinking, and in exhibiting his increasing weight to
interested observers. At his death he weighed thirty-five stones,
and measured 6 feet 8 inches in height. Most readers will express
surprise that the fatal issue was so long delayed in this rather
melancholy case, in which an abnormality in physical develop-
ment had operated decidedly to the prejudice and injury of the
unfortunate subject. And, despite the interest with which the
physiologist must regard such cases, it cannot be denied that
they present a reverse aspect which offers by no means pleasant
food for reflection to the student of poor humanity at large.
THE POLITY OF A POND.
" NOTHING to do," you say. Well, the mental condition implied
by these words is nearly if not quite as deplorable as that
involved in the related statement " nothing to wear." True, it
may be, as you point out, one cannot spend existence looking
out of a window surveying the meadow-lands and fields of the
quiet, flat Thames county of Oxon. One tires also of running
water, and your sketch-book has already acquired most of the
choice " bits " of copse and field, and well-nigh all the views of
those tall poplars that you care to paint. The trout in the
Thames are lazily inclined to-day, and even with ancient Izaak
himself for good company, the art piscatorial might tempt you in
vain. A sad disorder truly, this ennui, which, I take it, is the
fashionable name for the complaint affecting the nothing-to-do
constitution and its subjects. What say you, then, to a stroll
towards the copse by the pollard willows yonder ? " For what
purpose ? " you ask. Come and see. I have an idea I shall
pass a pleasant hour or two over the fruits of our journey. You
agree. A moment then, for preparation. There is a stowing of
phials into empty pockets, and the placing of a pocket lens in a
secure position. Then comes a linen " hand net " mounted on
a stick, such an apparatus as a fisherman would scoff at, and
which, exhibited before the eyes of nephew Charley a great
THE POLITY OF A POND. 233
authority in the capture of small fry by many cunning
expedients would subject me to ridicule of peculiarly sarcastic
kind, as the inquiry " where I am going a-fishing " is made.
The pollard willows mark the terminus of the expedition,
and these trees loom near enough at hand. Just beyond them
is a pool you know it well. For that pool we are to depart, on
a scientific mission bent. You look alarmed at the mention of
the word " scientific ; " but there is no cause for fear. I have
no intent to inflict a science lecture upon unwilling ears ; and
truth to tell in holiday times, the memories of lecture notes, and
blackboards, and diagrams, of chalk, of a long pointer, and of
other paraphernalia of the order scientific, are not over-welcome,
because of their reminding one of a return to the "Grad-grind"
philosophy of busy life, and because of their making holiday
scenes like the present vanish into mere thin reflections of
pleasant times. No, my friend, there shall be no "science
discourse for one" on this occasion. But you asked me to
invent an employment for an idle day. You besought me to
relieve the tedium of an aimless hour in a country life. And
I reply by conducting you to a favourite hunting-ground of
mine, whence I gather the treasures that constitute the liberal
" harvest of a quiet eye." Here we are at the spot in question.
You look around, but see nothing very attractive. Possibly not.
But sit down on the bank. The willows behind will screen you
from the sun. Permit ma to introduce you to a rich pasture
for the cultivation of an idle mind a pond, and its " tenants
at will."
We find in our pond a very fair example of a locality which,
dull enough to the unimaginative eye, may present the scientific
mind with food for reflection for many days to come. Vast
stores of microscopic wealth lie hidden before you; and a
zoological treasure-house, as well as a choice botanical herbarium,
234 THE POLITY OF A POND.
is included in the apparently dull prospect and within the
weed-bedecked limits of our pond. How thickly the osiers
and flags grow in the furthest corner of the watery domain.
Those flags that seem to have been irregularly cropped by some
careless reaper betoken the nocturnal dietary of the water-voles,
which steal out silently by night and nibble the reeds with a
relish that can best be imagined by those who have seen these
rodents feed. The duckweed grows thickly, too, beside us, and
canopies over a moiety of the pond, affording a grateful shade
and shelter to many a denizen of these waters, and likewise a
broad leafy platform whereon a perfect crowd of insects gather
to discuss the matters that most interest the aerial state and
life. The water-plantain, doubtless an emigrant from the near
river, appears to flourish within the quieter circle of the pool,
and now and then you may see its stems disturbed by the
energetic leaps and hops of one or two frogs that seem to be
amusing themselves in athletic feats in the far corner of the
pond.
The water in the warm days of summer has acquired a
green hue of very decided kind, and here and there you see
thick patches of the plant-life that will soon become
" The green mantle of the stagnant pool."
This lower plant-life the swarm of Confervoid species
flourishes apace beneath the kindly influences of the summer
sun. Composed of minute cells, each containing its quota of
chlorophyll the green colouring matter that enchants and
soothes your eye wherever you turn in living nature the mass
of lower plant life extends its limits with a rapidity that almost
defies calculation. Not Jonah's gourd grew with such rate of
cell-multiplication and increase as your lower plants; and
friends botanical will tell you, in language more learned perhaps
THE POLITY OF A POND. 235
than plain, of the mysteries of " zoospores " and " swarmspores "
and " oospores," by which names they mean to indicate the
curious little bodies discharged from the parent-cells, and which
after a free-swimming existence perpetuate these lower plant
species. Is it not curious to think that these lower plants
begin life as active free-swimmers ; so like animalcules that the
non-technical eye regarding them through the microscope
would receive with legitimate doubt the assertion of their plant
nature ? Could you glance with microscopic gaze beneath the
green scum of the pond, you would find a teeming population
of these moving seeds or " spores " of the lower plant life that
grows therein ; and doubtless hereafter we may see these spores
at home, as well as some other notable forms of plant-life that
find in pools, ponds, and ditches a local habitation, as well as
from the botanist a polysyllabic, name. These lower plants of
our ponds are technically called Algce. They are included in
the family circle of the seaweeds and their kin, and thus we
find included in the same family group forms which may be of
very large dimensions, like the great tangles or the Gulf-weed
occupying its acres upon acres of the Atlantic ; and plants which
on the other hand may descend to the extremes of minuteness,
and which are known only to the microscopist who has sought
out knowledge from the very confines of the world.
It is these Algas which, under other forms, occasionally per-
plex the simple-minded amongst us by suddenly dyeing our
pools a deep red hue v through the rapid multiplication of their
red-coloured species. And then is penned an epistle to " Mister
Editor," announcing the fact of the amazing phenomenon of
blood-red water having appeared in the pools and ponds, and
begging that the editorial " sweetness and light " may be cast
upon the event in question, as an assurance that the portent is
neither a bad omen, nor one of coming disasters or of wars and
336 THE POLITY OF A POND.
rumours thereof. So also when the fir-trees and conifers at
large discharge their yellow "pollen," which is blown by the
wind for miles, the appearance of this " yellow rain " perplexes
the soul innocent of elementary botany, and drives superstitious
folks to the borders of despair. From all of which circumstances
we may draw the conclusion that it behoves us to seek a little
of the wisdom that is in natural science, by way of understand-
ing some of the common events which occasionally disturb
the peace of mind of communities by no means invariably of
primitive kind.
But now let us " go a-fishing." No thoughts of lazy pike
or perch or of the humbler roach engage our mind. Our " fishes "
are of humbler grade, and such as the angler wots not of, whilst
the fare I may offer you as the result of our operations is not
physical but mental. With the improvised " bag-net," let us
obtain some of the green scum which lies just within reach,
and then let us fill our phials with samples of the pond water,
glancing here and there as we travel round its banks for traces
of samples of such rarer kind as may be represented in the
miniature world before us. A wide-mouthed jar receives a
portion of the pond's " green mantle," and phial after phial is
duly filled with specimens of water and of sundry living and
moving things which disport themselves therein. Already our
harvest seems promising. The " bag-net " has swept into our
phials more than one water insect, and sundry green specks
which we see rolling over and over upon themselves betoken a
rich treat at home in the way of microscopical examination.
A bit of pond-weed and one or two water-leaves have now been
secured for the sake of the chance population to which they
afford shelter. Of water-fleas we have a plenteous store, and I
should be afraid to say anything about the number of animal-
cular treasures, the existence of which you will have to take on
THE POLITY OF A POND. 237
trust, for the present at least, until the object-glass at home
shall reveal their whereabouts and nature.
We may now retrace our steps, laden with what to the
popular mind seems too often so much " rubbish," but in which
the gaze of a very elementary philosophy may reveal much that
is curious, a great deal that is inexplicable, and everything that
is interesting. The picture drawn so happily and with such
deft touch in the " Ingoldsby Legends," of the " man of a very
contemplative mood," who
would pore by the hour, o'er a weed or a flower,
Or the slugs that come crawling out after a shower,"
is one which, in respect of the apparently absurd nature of the
search after knowledge, meets with the sarcastic approval of the
work-a-day world. And the misguided man who,
" Instead of enjoying a sociable chat,
Still poking his nose into this and to that,
At a gnat, or a bat, or a cat, or a rat,
Or great ugly things, all legs and wings,
With nasty long tails armed with nasty long stings."
is regarded, as a rule, as a person who may be an enthusiastic
observer of nature indeed, but with whose proclivities polite
society need not be expected to exhibit much or any sympathy.
Scientific philosophy happily carries its own reward, however,
and is in any case thoroughly removed above the popular
criticism whose world simply exists in the commonplaces of life
after all. An,d so consoling ourselves with the knowledge of
our advantages, we trudge homewards, halting for a moment at
the brook a tributary of the larger river that rolls past the mill
to look at the " caddis-worms " that struggle in its bed, and
to add some of these beings to our store of curiosities.
Arranging our apparatus in suitable array close by the
window, with a fine southern exposure lending us a brilliant
238 THE POLITY OF A POND.
illumination for our microscope mirror, we proceed to the
business of learning something regarding the teeming population
of the waters we have left. Dip the first with a phial of green
water presents us with an object of interest. Rolling round and
round upon itself in the field of vision, in company with several
companions and with other forms of lower life, you perceive
a living globe, fringed, as you can see after attentively watching
it, with a series of delicate filaments we name cilia. What is
this curious living sphere which exists by the hundred in the
pond ? Is it an animal, as by its movements you might at first
sight suppose, or is it a plant, as its green colour might lead you
to believe? Can the botanist claim it as his own, or the
zoologist adopt it as a foster-child? Had you asked these
questions some years ago, you would have been told that the
zoologist was its proper guardian. In this light it was regarded
as an animal form, and was named the Globe Animalcule ( Volvox
globator). But nowadays we have grown wiser, and knowing
that Volvox is a true plant, despite its absolute freedom and
motion, we hand it over to the botanist, who places it in that large
family circle, known as the Algx, to which group you have
already been introduced. Placed thus in the vegetable kingdom,
and amidst its lowest members, the question still remains, what
is this Volvox f In diameter it averages the one-fiftieth part
of an inch. dimensions which may be considered gigantic when
compared with many of the animalcules disporting themselves
beside it Imagine a clear globe, dotted with little green specks
placed at tolerably regular intervals. When the light is skil-
fully disposed, these green bodies are seen to be connected by
delicate lines, the Volvox externally resembling a kind of net-
work, with emeralds at the angles of the meshes.
But let us look more closely at these green bodies. Each
when examined separately is pear-shaped, the stalk end of the
THE POLITY OF A POND. 239
pear abutting against the edge of the volvox globe, whilst attached
to this end we find two delicate filaments, representing micro-
scopic eyelashes the cilia. The cilia, by aid of which the
Volvox swims, are therefore the belongings of these green
bodies, each of which is called a zoospore. How cilia move?
why they vibrate with unceasing regularity ? why they continue
to move for a longer or shorter period after the death of the
being to which they belong? how they thus act in utter
independence of the nervous system? are amongst the deep
puzzles of modern physiology.
But what of the green zoospores of which the Volvox appears
to be composed? In the early days of the microscope, they
Were regarded as animals ; a certain bright red spot occasionally
seen in some of these green bodies was named an " eye ; " and
some hollow spaces were credited with performing the function
of stomachs. But the bright ^red spot is known to occur in
many other lower forms of both plant and animal nature, and
whilst, it is true, its appearance seems compatible with the idea
of its being a rudimentary "eye," its mere presence is no
criterion of the animal nature of its possessor. The clear spaces
which are seen to " beat " as if they were little hearts are
likewise the common property of lower animals and plants, but
their function is unknown. There is thus no ground for sup-
porting the animal nature of Volvox ; whilst on the other hand,
when we survey the Algaj family at large, we find that the
" zoospores " are very typical belongings of that group. The
zoospores discharged from other freshwater plants of lower
kind, exactly resemble those of Volvox, which may thus be
regarded as a colony or collection of these green bodies. You
must not neglect to notice, however, that within the Volvox
you may discern some half-dozen other small green spheres,
which often revolve on their own account, as their
2 4 o THE POLITY OF A POND.
rolls onwards on its course through the waters. When you gain
a nearer glimpse of these little green spheres, you see that
they resemble the Volvox in every respect, save in size. They
are, in fact, the progeny of the plant, and have been facetiously
named the "daughters" by the botanical world ; and occasionally
we may find that within the " daughter " Volvoces other pro-
geny may in turn be discerned ; three generations of these or-
ganisms being thus associated together in singular combination.
How has the process of multiplication been carried out? To
answer the query we must study the emerald " zoospores " once
more. ' At certain periods, a zoospore may be seen to divide itself
into two or more parts, and a series of new cells is formed by
the division of one. Ultimately the green cells thus produced
become zoospores, develop cilia, and assume their place as
essential parts of the new Volvox, which has thus been produced
from a zoospore of its parent. When thus developed, the young
Volvox is at first attached to the wall of the parent-globe. Soon
it detaches itself, and rolls about in the parental interior, whilst
it will be ultimately liberated and allowed to escape into the
world of waters around, but not before it has itself given origin
to " daughters " of its own.
So much for the " Globe animalcule" which belies its
popular name in that it is a veritable plant. We shall dip into
another phial close at hand, and with our " dipping tube " we
may secure one or two of the little specks you can see moving
about so actively within the limits of the jar. This feat accom-
plished, and the objects in question safely transferred to our
slide, you may enter upon a study of animal life, and that of by
no means the lowest grade. You now see a curious little being,
which authority in matters zoological has compared to a split
pear in shape. It certainly possesses a head which is pear-
shaped, and a tail which is pointed ; and you see that the head ,
THE POLITY OF A POND. 241
moreover, is covered by a large shield. In front you will be able
to discern a single black speck placed in the middle of the head.
This is the eye. And you may see that the creature possesses
two pairs of feelers, one pair being much longer than the other.
A neighbour swiftly paddling its way in the neighbourhood of
our prisoner is seen to propel itself by the long pair of feelers,
like a waterman pulling a pair of oars. The animal in external
appearance is certainly a curious creature. You ask the nature
of the animal we have been regarding, and I reply, the Cyclops
quadricornis, or in plain English, " the four-horned water-flea
with the one eye."
There are few persons who have not heard of the water-fleas,
which, despite their name, are not insects, but poor relations of
the crabs and shrimps. Indeed, looking at the Cyclops generally,
there is to be perceived an indistinct resemblance to a shrimp.
Interesting in many ways is the animal before us. It possesses
neither heart nor breathing-organs, but contrives through
adaptations of nature's own devising to bustle through life and
water-fleas certainly spend their existence in a state of perpetual
hurry without these organs. Well provided in the matter of
jaws and limbs, is our Cyclopean friend. At least three pairs of
jaws are represented, and the feet number five pairs. I do not
know whether the argument for "woman's rights" has ever
been supported by comparative anatomy, but an enthusiastic
advocate of the removal of the disabilities of the weaker sex,
might find the facts of natural history to support his argument
very materially, even admitting that opponents might deem his
comparison transcendental and his premises wrong. I refer to
the fact that the superiority of the male sex is not universal in
the world of animal life. Mrs. Cyclops is a magnificent
creature as compared with the partner of her joys and sorrows.
Mrs. Araneina, the representative of the spider family, is not
B
242 THE POLITY OF A POND.
merely much bigger than her mate, but is a fearful shrew, and
sometimes goes the extreme length of eating and devouring her
" puir man," as runs the Scottish familiarity for designating a
henpecked husband. Lady Rotifer of the Wheel-animalcule
family a branch of the animalcules of high repute in the social
scale is a very superior person as compared with Lord Rotifer.
The latter is not only smaller than his partner, but if the
wonderful and curious fact must be told, he is a deformed and
insignificant person ; possessing no internal anatomy to speak of,
and presenting a living realization of the old lady's comment on
her minister's discourse, in respect of the said discourse lacking
vigour and having " nae vitals." And last of all, to bring the
facts nearer home and to the vertebrates themselves, one may
point to the female eagles and falcons as being larger and more
powerful than their lords and masters.
To return to Mrs. Cyclops, we find that the gentler sex is
readily recognizable by the presence of two curious pouches
attached one on each side of .the tail. As we peer into these
receptacles we see that they contain numerous little round
bodies, the future progeny of the Cyclopean family in the
shape of eggs. Thus the mother Cyclops may actually count
her progeny before they are hatched, since during the process
of development, they are carried about in the double cradle
just mentioned. "When hatched, Cyclops, junior, appears at
first as a little three-jointed animal, possessing a pair of legs
to each joint. Then the hinder portion of the body grows
backwards, and becoming jointed forms the chest and tail.
Moult after moult takes place ; and finally the first three
pairs of legs which the young Cyclops possessed become the
four feelers and the two large jaws of the adult water-flea ;
the eye, originally double, having meanwhile grown single.
Another application to our phials is found to result, after a
THE POLITY OF A POND. 243
careful scrutiny of their contents, in the discovery of certain
other Crustaceans which rejoice in the common title of Water-
fleas, although, indeed, they belong, zoologically regarded, to
very distinct and different families. Here, for example, is
Cypris, which in point of its common occurrence rivals its one-
eyed neighbour although, indeed, Cypris itself has but a single
eye, or at most an imperfectly divided one. But you see at
once the marked difference between Cypris and Cyclops, since
the former has its body enclosed in a double " shell," that at
first sight reminds you of a miniature mussel. This " shell "
of Cypris is really worth your study. You observe that it con-
sists of two halves joined by a hinge along the back, and it can
be opened and shut by the action of special muscles, the exist-
ence of which mechanism in such a small body, is, in itself, a
source of legitimate wonder. Cypris has but two pairs of really
useful swimming feet, but its jaws are complex, and like Cyclops
it wants a heart. The eggs in the Cypris are carried within the
shell, the outer egg-sacs of the Cyclops being unrepresented
here. But Cypris-development waxes in complexity over that
of Cyclops. No less than nine different stages have been
described, so that the nine stages of Cypris may parallel some-
what the seven ages of man.
The Cypris-tribe present us with an antiquity and descent
of highly respectable kind. These little shelled tenants of our
ponds must have literally swarmed in certain fresh and salt
waters of the past. As early as Silurian times, we find near
neighbours of Cypris represented as fossils through the preser-
vation of their " shells ; " and Cypris itself makes its appearance
tolerably far back in the geological record. One more example
and we may leave the further knowledge of the Water-fleas as
a matter for personal cultivation. This time the specimen is
of larger size and more curious shape than before. You ob-
244 THE POLITY OF A POND.
serve the branched feelers in front of the head. These organs
enable you to pronounce the form before you to be the
" Branched-horned water-flea " (Daphnia pulex). Differing
from its neighbours Cyclops and Cypris in the character of its
feelers, by means of which it swims, we find it to possess a shell
composed of two halves. Like Cyclops it has a single eye, and
the gills or breathing-organs are borne on the five pairs of legs
attached to the chest. The Branched-horned is also peculiar
in other respects. Messieurs the Branched-horned are few in
number and small in size when compared with Mesdames, as in
the neighbouring families of the Water-flea race. The young
Daphnize are produced from eggs, but the study of their develop-
ment reveals certain peculiarities worth notice. The ordinary
eggs called " summer eggs " vary from ten to fifty in number,
and are retained within the shell until the young Branched-
horns are developed. The " winter eggs," on the other hand,
number two, and these ultimately pass into a chamber in the
back of the shell, known from its shape as the " saddle." This
saddle-shaped cavity is cast off at the succeeding moult of the
animal, and sinks to the bottom of the water with its contained
eggs. In the returning spring, the eggs are hatched and the
Daphnia} are duly developed. Such a contrivance appears to
exist for the purpose of continuing the Daphnia-race during the
cold of winter. Eelated to our Water-fleas may be mentioned
the curious Brine shrimps (Artemia) which live in the Salt Pans
at Lymington, in a briny solution of sufficient strength to pickle
beef, and which also occur in the Great Salt Lake at Utah, and
in other salt lakes in both hemispheres. The Fairy shrimps
which, with their clear and transparent bodies, seem to flit
through the fresh waters they inhabit, are also related to our
Water-fleas, whose brief history may thus be concluded.
If our microscopic researches have interested you so far, let
THE POLITY OF A POND. 245
us look at the fragments of pond-weed and confervoid scum we
have secured. No better field for microscopic inquiry exists
than the weeds of the pond, or in the " green mantle " of its
surface. Each leaf then becomes a veritable world of lower life,
and teems with a varied population of both plant and animal
life. We snip off a small fragment of this water-weed, adjust
it amidst a few drops of its native element on the microscope-
slide, and then behold a scene so busy and so full of bustle,
that we are tempted for a moment to think that the noise and
din of the miniature world before us should find its echo in our
own existence. There, attached to one side of the fragment,
you see a colony of Bell-animalcules, or Vort icellce. Each con-
sists of a bell-shaped head supported on a stalk, the head being
fringed with moving cilia, similar to those you saw in Volvox.
Very busy are the Bell-animalcules to-day. Everywhere around
them there is stirrage of the particles which float in the water ;
and now and then some free-swimming animalcule, coming
within reach of the ciliary currents, is whirled round and round
in a veritable vortex until it collides with the bell-shaped head,
which immediately seems to disappear as if by magic. The
stalk is highly contractile, and coils itself into a spiral form
whenever the head is irritated, releasing and straightening itself
when the alarm is overpast the action, indeed, reminding you
most of all of the behaviour of the spirally coiled wire that
constitutes the chief mechanism of a Jack-in-the-box. A tap
on the glass slide causes the whole colony of bell-heads to dis-
appear, but a moment later they sweep out again, their stalks
uncoil, their cilia vibrate, and the busy work of sweeping food-
particles into the mouths is resumed. And you will please
bear in mind that all this activity and sensation takes place
and occurs without the vestiges of nerves. Sensation in lower
life you see to be performed in entire disregard of the fact
246 THE POLITY OF A POND.
that nerves are utterly wanting a general sensitiveness of the
body-substance doing duty in a perfect fashion for the defined
sensory apparatus of higher forms. The presence of such a
colony of active beings must be a sad aggravation to more
peaceably inclined animalcules, which, as you observe, are
swept hither and thither, not by "winds of doctrine," like
certain unstable particles in your world and mine, but by
veritable and strong currents excited and maintained by the
ever-active cilia that fringe the " bells."
A new form, however, looms across our view. Paddling its
way once again by the ever-recurring cilia, like some large
vessel amongst small craft at anchor, comes a green trumpet-
shaped body, which now fixes itself by the lesser end of its
frame, and then works its cilia like a steamer moored to a pier,
but with its paddles in full swing. This is the Stentor, or
Trumpet-animalcule, which can move itself or detach its
frame from fixed objects at will, as you have just seen. In
reality it resembles a Bell-animalcule minus a stalk, and as you
note when it does attach itself, the cilia of its head-extremity
begin to work at once and to create the currents which sweep
the food particles by the score into the mouth. For like a wise
animalcule, the Stentor rests that it may eat, and thus differs
from hundreds of its smaller neighbours which are ever on the
move, and which pass their existence, like some units of human
kind, in one perpetual state of bustle. You observe that Stentor
is coloured green. The colour is imparted by the same matter
chlorophyll that you saw in the plant Volvox, or that you
discern in every green leaf. The animal may thus manufacture
the substance of the plant, and defies chemistry to say where
the animal world and animal powers end, or where the plant
world and plant functions truly begin.
Stentor is off on its tour after a brief respite, and our Bell-
THE POLITY OF A POND. 247
animalcules for a time appear to have the field to themselves.
Softly ; here is another being which comes rapidly upon the
scene. Now it appears in full view ; and a moment later, with
aggravating intent, has swiftly sped out of view. Again it
comes into the microscopic circle of our acquaintance, and fixing
itself by its tail like Stentor, expands certain curious organs
placed on its head, and like the latter animalcule creates a stir
in its neighbourhood by the currents it excites. Watch those
head-organs closely. You seem to see two revolving wheels.
But things are not what they seem in the present case. The
" wheels " are two round bodies which are absolutely stationary,
and the revolving appearance is produced by the continuous and
regular motion of the cilia with which they are provided. The
illusion is produced much in the same way as when looking at
the golden grain of autumn you appear to see the corn-stalks
rushing in waves across the field when the light winds stir the
stalks. Each stalk simply bends in its turn, just as each ciliuni
moves in regular order and in its due sequence to produce the
" wheel " before you. But the older naturalists called them
Wheel-animalcules, through a belief that the " wheels " did
revolve, and by this name, as well as by that of the Rotifera,
they are still known. The being you are looking at is the
Rotifer vulgaris, or common Wheel-animalcule itself. And now
and then you will see other species of the class flit, like the
ghosts of animalcules, across the field of vision. You can see
through and through their bodies ; and if the animalcule will
only remain passive for a minute, you can learn a lesson in
comparative anatomy with the greatest ease. The Wheel-
animalcules are always to be known by these wheel-like heads.
Then you note that within their bodies are contained systems
of organs which Stentor and the Bell-heads want. You can
trace the movements of the jaws, working like hammers on an
248 THE POLITY OF A POND.
anvil in the Rotifer, and now and then you see the general con-
traction of the body produced by muscular action, and curious
movements of the internal organs as well. Altogether the
Wheel-animalcules are beings of high structure. Your text-
book of zoology will tell you that they possess a big nervous
mass, certain sense-organs, eye-spots, a system of vessels for
water-circulation, a complete digestive system, and a perfect
provision of muscles. And if you care to pursue your study of
them further, I will promise you a rich harvest of intellectual
delight.
Such study, however, must be left for another day. I may
only at present tell you that they were first discovered by old
Leeuwcnhoek, a Dutch observer, and a famous grinder of micro-
scope-glasses. It was Leeuwenhoek who, in 1675, first beheld the
Bell-animalcules, and in 1702, he first saw the Wheel-animalcules
in some coloured water which had collected in a gutter of his
house-roof. At the present day we know a good deal about the
Rotifers, the list of species yearly increases, and the fascination of
the study does not diminish on closer acquaintance with their life
and habits. Within their family circle are tube-builders and
house-constructors ; the lady Rotifers exhibit the superiority to
their partners already alluded to ; and last of all, they seem to
possess a vitality past comprehension as to its limits, and
beyond explanation as to its details. In nature the Rotifers are
dried up from their pools by the heat of the summer sun, and
as mere mummified dust-specks they are blown about by the
summer winds. You may dry them as they lie on your micro-
scope-slide, till not a trace of motion remains, and you may keep
them thus dried and parched for days, weeks, months, or even
years. Yet, after such desiccation and drying, if you but add a
drop of water, or place them therein, the functions of life are
renewed and resumed with vigour, as if no epoch of Rip Van
THE POLITY OF A POND. 249
Winkleism, with its awakening to a new life, had taken place.
In what condition the organs, systems, and tissues of the Wheel-
animalcules exist during their mummy-life, physiology does not
yet explain; and how this suspended animation, simulating
death, can persist for such lengthened periods with certainty of
perfect revival, zoologists do not profess to make clear. But
the facts are before you in all their wondrous significance, and
you may profitably ponder upon life in a new aspect if you will.
Should another Horace Smith appear wanting another mummy-
subject for a poetic address, he may find one more wondrous far
than that of Belzoni's Exhibition in the Eotifer and its history,
and may dedicate his highest poetic aspirations to the celebra-
tion of the animalcule's startling return from dryness and
barrenness to the activity of existence.
The "green mantle" of the pool teems with both animal
and plant life in its lower aspects, as a glance at a fragment of
conferva will show. But the shadows begin to gather and the
light to fail, and what further study you feel inclined to pursue
amidst weeds and water-fleas, must be left for another day. I
can promise you, at least, an over-abundance of material for
many days to come. One more peep at the microscope-field, and
we shall put away our studies in pond-life for to-day. By the
hundred, gathered on the margins of the delicate green cells
that compose the confervze of the pond's surface, you behold the
Diatomacex and their neighbours those lowest plants with the
beautiful flinty envelopes, marked and sculptured in a thousand
ways and forms. It is the study of a lifetime to figure and
describe, and still more to understand, these lowest beings in
their true nature ; and forsooth we must pass them by to-day,
with a glance at the varied form and beauteous structure. You
also see the Amoeba that speck of protoplasm, affording a text
for many a valued lesson in your zoology class-room gliding,
250 THE POLITY OF A POND.
like Proteus of old, from one form to another, ever shifting its
shape, and well-nigh as unstable as the water in which it lives.
A mere speck of protoplasm is this Amoeba ; but when you think
you have mastered the problem of vitality, let me recommend
you to place your eye to the microscope, to watch the acts of an
Amoeba, to look through and through the living speck, and then
to say if, after all, the theory of the class-room brings you
nearer to the solution of the question " What is life ? "
The Caddis-worms are in the phial at your elbow. And
they deserve a word in passing. That is the larva or grub of
the Alder-fly, dear to the heart of the angler. You see, by aid of
the lens, its jaws, its six feet, and its seven pairs of curious gill-
plumes, adapting it for an aquatic type of breathing. Here are
your true Caddis-worms, well-known to Aristotle himself,
and near relations of the big dragon-flies that sweep continually
over the pond yonder. Gluing together bits of sticks, fragments
of gravel, and grains of sand, and other odds and ends to be
picked up in its native waters, these baby-insects pass their
time in the active pursuit of the water-fleas, and live merrily
enough in the bed of the clear-running brooks around. When
maturity and its cares dawn upon the Caddis-worms, the
mouth of the case is closed by a silken grating, spun, as are the
threads which bind its materials together, from a silken gland
placed in the mouth. Then the case ruptures, and the winged
insect, having passed through its chrysalis state in the silent
retirement of its abode, appears on the scene, henceforth dis-
carding the waters and leading the aerial life of its kind. To
watch the Caddis-worms is, in truth, no uninteresting study for
part of a summer holiday.
Now let us push our phials and microscope aside. You had
no idea the time would pass so quickly; and you have been
interested in a very superficial glance at the polity of the pond.
THE POLITY OF A POND. 251
It is always so in science studies which a love of nature may
tempt you to pursue. You will no longer move about "in
worlds not realized," as Wordsworth puts it. One glimpse of
nature but leads to a deeper sight and to nearer looking ; and
your nature-studies bring with them the delight in a world
fair to see, but fairer still when more truly known. But I am
tempted to moralize, and you have no need of such counsel.
We shall not exhaust the pond yet awhile ; for there are water-
spiders to see, and the newts wait to be watched. But to-day's
labours are over, and we may shake hands and say " well done "
over to-day's work. Come : we shall stroll round the garden
and see the moon rise, and to-morrow we shall again " go a-
fishins."
INDEX.
Adipocere, 26
Algse, 235
Alternation of generations, 89
Amoeba, 250
Arachnidans, 98
Aram, Eugene, case of, 30
Arden, Enoch, 13
Australia, zoology of, 211, et seq.
B
Baleen. See Whalebone
Barnacle, Autobiography of, 176
Bell-animalcules, 245
Bennett, 6
Blood-stains, tests for, 3, et seq.
Blowing of whales, 121
Bone-setting, 59
Caddis-worms, 250
Carbonic acid gas, 193
Chamisso, 90
Chlorophyll, 193, 234
Clotho, a spider, 112
Conde, Prince of, 11
Cooper, Sir Astley, 9
Crime and science, 1
Cumberland, Duke of, 9
Cuttlefishes, giant, 218, et seq.
Cyclops, 241
Cypris, 243
D
Daphnia, 244
Darwin, 126, 127, 128, 178
Dawn of life, animalcule, 160
Diatoms, 249
Dugongs, 133
Electric ray, 174
Eozoon, 160
Epeira, a spider, 106, 107, 108, 109
E
Fasting, 138
Fishes, giant, 226
Fly, autobiography of, 194
Food, 138 ; rules for taking, 139 ;
of plants, 143
Foraminifera, 164
Fossil, oldest, 159
Fossil whales, 136
254
INDEX,
Galton, 1
Ghosts of science, 148
Giants, 215 ; human, 227, et seq.
Gills of fishes, 172
Globe-animacule. See Volvox
Hair-dyes, injurious effects of, 53
Homology, 124
Hydra, 81
Identification, cases of, 22, et seq.
Jamrach's, At, 64, et seq.
Jelly-fishes, 71
Jessopp, Dr., 157
K
Kangaroos, 203
Leaves, 187
Lost and missing, 22
Lyons Mail, story of, 39
Macropus, 205
Manatees, 133
Marsupials. See Kangaroos
Medical By-ways, 43
Milk as a food, 141
Mind, influence of, on disease, 54,
55
Missing persons, 22
Mussels, 114
Nauplius, 182
Nicolai
ai of Berlin, 149
Opossums, 210
Parkman, Dr., case of, 31
Patch, Mr., case of, 9
Peripatus, 114
Pinna, 116
Placoid scales, 170
Polity of a pond, 233
Pond life, 233
Presumption of death, 13
Quack medicines, 46, et seq.
Rays, 168
Rhytina, 134
Rudimentary organs, 130
Science and ghosts, 148
Science and crime, 1
Sea-acorn, 179
Sea-cows, 133
Sea-horses, 209
Sensations, 153, 154, 155
Sensitive plant, 190
Sirenia, 133
Skates and rays, 168
Sperm whale, 132
Spiders, 96, et seq.
Starvation, 153, et seq.
Stentor, 246
Suicide and homicide, 11
Survivorship, 13, 17
INDEX.
255
Tendrils, 191
Thread-cells, 81
Threads and thrums, 9G
Underwoods, case of, 17
Veins of leaves, 192
Venus' Flytrap, 189
Volvox, 238
Vorticellae, 245
W
Walsh, Caroline, case of, 27
Water as a food, 140
Water-fleas, 240, et seq.
Waterloo Bridge murder, 33
Whalebone, 123 ; origin of, 126
Whales, 118
Wheel-animalcules, 247
Wings, movements of, in fly, 20
Zeuglodon, 137
Zoophytes, 87
Zoospores, '239
November, i '30.
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CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued
BY W. CLARK RUSSELL.
Round the Galley Fire.
On the Fo'k'sle Head.
In the Middle Watch.
A Voyage to the Cane-
A Book for the Hammock.
The Mystery of the "Ocean Star."
The Romance of Jenny Harlowe,
BY GEORGE AUGUSTUS SAL A.
Gaslight and Daylight.
BY JOHN SAUNDERS.
Guy Waterman. | Two Dreamers.
The Lion in the Path.
BY KATHARINE SAUNDERS.
Joan Merryweather. | The High Mills.
Margaret and Elizabeth.
Heart Salvage. I Sebastian.
BY GEORGE R. SIMS.
Rogues and Vagabonds.
The Ring o' Bells. ! Mary Jane Married.
Mary Jane's Memoirs.
Tales of To-day.
Dramas of Life.
BY ARTHUR SKETCHLEY.
A Match In the Dark.
BY T. W. Sl'EIGHT.
The Mysteries of Heron Dyke.
TheGoldenHoop. By Devious Ways.
BY R. A. STERN DALE.
The Afghan Knife.
BY R. LOUIS STEVENSON.
New Arabian Nights, | Prince Otto.
BY BERTHA THOMAS.
Cressida. 1 Proud Maiale.
The Violin Player.
BY W. MOY THOMAS.
A Fight for Life.
BY WALTER THORNBURY.
Tales for the Marines.
Old Stories Re-told.
BY T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPS.
Diamond Cut Diamond.
By F. ELEANOR TROLLOPS.
Like Ships upon the Sea.
Anne Furness. | Mabel's Progress.
POPULAR SHILLING BOOKS.
Jeff Briggs's Love Story. BRET HARTE. Was She Good or Bad ?
The Twins of Table Mountain. By
BRET HARTE.
A Day's Tour. By PERCY FITZGERALD.
Esther's Glove. By R. E. FRANCILLON
Sentenced! By SOMERVILLE GIBNEV.
The Professor's Wife. By L. GRAHAM.
Mrs. Gainsborough's Diamonds. By
IULIAN HAWTHORNE.
Niagara Spray. By J. HOLLINGSHEAD.
A Romance of the Queen's Hounds.
By CHARLES JAMES.
The Garden that Paid the Rent. By
TOM JERROLD.
Cut by the Mess. By AKTHUR KEYSER.
Our Sensation Novel. Edited by JUSTIN
H. MCCARTHY, M.P.
Dolly. By JUSTIN H. MCCARTHV, M.P.
Lily Lass. JUSTIN H. MCCARTHY, M.P.
ILL, t : c.
CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued'
BY ANTHONY TROLLOPS.
The Way We Live Now.
The American Senator.
Frau Frohmann. | Marlon Fay
Kept in the Dark.
Mr. Scarborough's Family.
The Land-Leaguers. JohnCaldigata
The Golden Lion of Granpere.
BY J. T. TROWBRIDGE.
Farnell's Folly.
BY IVAN TURGENIEFF, &c.
Stories from Foreign Novelists.
BY MARK TWAIN.
Tom Sawyer. | A Tramp Abroad.
The Stolen White Elephant.
A Pleasure Trip on the Continent
Huckleberry Finn. [of Europe.
Life on the Mississippi.
The Prince and the Pauper.
BY C. C. FRASER-TYTLER.
Mistress Judith.
BY SARAH TYTLER.
What She Came Through.
The Bride's Pass, i Buried Diamonds.
Saint Mungo's City.
Beauty and the Beast.
Lady Bell, j Noblesse Oblige.
Citoyenne Jacqueline I Disappeared.
The Huguenot Family.
The Blackball Ghosts.
BY J. S. WINTER.
Cavalry Life. | Regimental Legends
BY H. F. WOOD.
The Passenger from Scotland Yard.
The Englishman of the Rue Cain.
BY LADY WOOD.
Sabina.
BY CELIA PARKER WOOLLEY.
Rachel Armstrong: or, Love&Theology.
BY EDMUND YATES.
The Forlorn Hope. | Land at Last.
Castaway.
By W. MINTO.
That Girl in Black. By Sirs. MOLKS-
WORTH.
Notes from the " News " JAS. PAY*.
Beyond the Gates. By E. S. PHELPS.
Old Maid's Paradise. By E.S. PHILFS.
Burglars in Paradise. By E. S. PHKLPS.
Jack the Fisherman. By E. S. PHELPS.
Trooping with Crows. By C. L. PIRKIS
Bible Characters. By CH \s. READE.
Rogues. By R. H. SHERAFD.
The Dagonet Reciter. By G. R. SIMS.
How the Poor Live. By G. R. SIMS.
The Case of George Canolemas. liy
GEORGE R. SIMS. [SPEIGHT.
The Sandycroft Mystery. By T. VV.
Hoodwinked. By T. W SPEIGHT.
Father Damien. By R. L. STEVENSOH
A Double Bond. By I.INLA VILLARI.
J. OGDKM AND CO. LIMITED, PRINTERS, GREAT SAFFRON
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