NEW-YORK * CINCIKNATI : GHICAOO 
 
 AMERICAN- 
 BOOK-COMPANY 
 
// )>. y y 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 .OGt - GIF ' 
 
 Received 
 Accession No. $ / 7 Q ..3... 
 
 
McGUFFEY'S NATURAL HISTORY READERS 
 
 LIVING CREATURES 
 
 OF 
 
 WATER, LAND, AND AIR 
 
 FOR THE FOURTH READER GRADE 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN MONTEITH, M.A. 
 
 NEW-YORK : CINCINNATI .: CHICAGO 
 
 AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 
 
6\ 
 
 3_\O^ .cC* 
 *\^ v 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THE object of MCGUFFEY'S NATURAL HISTORY READERS 
 is primarily to furnish to children v both at home and in 
 school, interesting and instructive reading in the form of 
 book literature. While no attempt is made to teach sci- 
 ence, the hope is cherished that the descriptions of animal 
 habits and characteristics may, incidentally, stimulate a love 
 of nature, and of science, the interpreter of nature. 
 
 "FAMILIAR ANIMALS," addressing a lower grade of ad- 
 vancement, confined its subjects to mammals, because the 
 facts connected with this class are apparent, and are more 
 easily comprehended. 
 
 "LIVING CREATURES," in respect to grade of thought 
 and expression, takes a step forward. Treating of animals 
 scarcely less familiar, and even more interesting, it enters 
 the field of the lower groups of animal life, where the facts 
 are more remote from ordinary view, demanding closer at- 
 tention and thought. 
 
 To render the illustrations in the highest degree accurate 
 and helpful, the publishers have employed the services of 
 artists whose study and practice have made them specialists 
 in particular departments of animal drawing. 
 
 Copyright, 1888, by VAN ANTWERP, BRAGG & Co. 
 
 MO. LIV. CREA. 
 E-P 7 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 LESSON PAGE 
 
 1. Eyes and No Eyes .... Mrs. Bdrbaiild. 5 
 
 2. A Busy Skeleton n 
 
 3. Jewel-makers and Island Builders ..... 18 
 
 4. Among the Shells ........ 23 
 
 5. The Clam 26 
 
 6. The Clam's Shell 32 
 
 7. Some Uses of Clams . . . . . . . -35 
 
 8. The Oyster 38 
 
 9. Oyster-catching ....... -44 
 
 10. Pearls and Pearl-makers ....... 48 
 
 11. The Snail . .53 
 
 12. The Snail's Gay Relations . . . . . .57 
 
 13. Living Pinchers . . . . . . . .62 
 
 14. Crabs .65 
 
 15. Leeuwenhoek ......... 67 
 
 16. Spiders 70 
 
 17. Miss Spider's Wedding Breakfast . . Miss Barr. 76 
 
 18. Among the Insects ........ 76 
 
 19. A Musical Burglar 83 
 
 20. To a Mosquito Bryant. 88 
 
 21. The House Cricket . . . Rennie and West-wood. 89 
 
 22. Crickets of the Field . . . Rennie and Weshvood. 91 
 
 23. Busy Bees . . . . . . . . .92 
 
 24. A Nice Little Housekeeper . Jenny and the Insects. 101 
 
 25. Butterflies and Moths 108 
 
 26. The Silk-worm . . . . . . . . .112 
 
 27. Facts About Insects 116 
 
 28. Among the Fishes . . . . .-.-. . .124 
 
 29. Roman Fish Ponds .... Rev. W. Houghton. 132 
 
 30. "! Go A Fishing" 135 
 
 31. Another View of Fishing ....... 139 
 
 32 Toads and Frogs ........ 140 
 
 33. Snakes 145 
 
 (iii) 
 
IV CONTENTS. 
 
 LESSON PAGE 
 
 34. How a Turtle Taught a Lesson . . St. Nicholas. 150 
 
 35. The Box-tortoise and Its Kin 154 
 
 36. Lizards and Crocodiles J 57 
 
 37. Audubon .......... 160 
 
 38. Among the Birds 165 
 
 39. Water-skimmers and Flyers 171 
 
 40. Wading Birds and Shore Birds 174 
 
 41. The Stork . . . . . . . Miss Kirby. 178 
 
 42. Birds of the Land ... . . . . . 180 
 
 43. The Camel-bird 182 
 
 44. Birds of the Air The Pigeon . . . . . .185 
 
 45. "Lions of the Air" ........ 188 
 
 46. Monkeys in Feathers . . . .. . . . . IQ 2 
 
 47. Red-head and his Music -194 
 
 48. The Canary . . . . . 'IV. T. Green. 196 
 
 49. The Crow 198 
 
 50. Facts About Birds 200 
 
 51. A Bird Nation 202 
 
 2. The Great Singers 205 
 
 Robin-redbreast. 
 
I. EYES AND NO EYES. 
 
 MORE than a hundred years ago, lived Mrs. Bar- 
 bauld in a quiet place in England where, with her 
 husband, she kept a small school for children. Her 
 deep interest in her pupils and in children generally, 
 together with her simple and pleasant style of writing, 
 made her a great favorite. Her books for the young 
 are among the few that have outlived the age in which 
 they appeared. 
 
 (v) 
 
6 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 One of the charming little books containing Mrs. 
 Barbauld's writings is entitled ''Evenings at Home." 
 In it is included a story called "Eyes and No Eyes, 
 or the Art of Seeing." This story is here selected 
 and adapted to introduce some short histories of living 
 creatures that are to be found in this marvelous world 
 in which we live. These creatures could never have 
 been described had there been no sharp and careful 
 eyes. Much less can their wonderful characters be 
 understood unless dull and thoughtless eyes can be 
 made bright and quick. Sharp wits follow sharp eyes. 
 
 A few words of explanation must precede the two 
 boys in the story. They lived a hundred years ago, 
 and wore the dress peculiar to their time. Their coats 
 were short, and were called "monkey-jackets." Their 
 trousers were tight, and terminated at the knees. Then 
 followed long stockings and very low shoes, which were 
 apt to stick in the mud and come off. 
 
 Boys, a hundred years ago, had a bad habit of car- 
 rying their hands in their pockets, when they had 
 pockets. The best way to cure them of this habit was 
 to sew up the pockets, or, better, to have no pockets 
 at all. The latter was precisely the case with the two 
 boys of Mrs. Barbauld's story. The only pocket they 
 had was just capacious enough to hold a handkerchief. 
 This fact will explain the reason why, when the boy 
 of a hundred years ago found rusty nails, pieces of 
 tin and glass, wet clams and dirty marbles, he did not, 
 like the boy of to-day, thrust them into his pocket, 
 but rather tied them up in his handkerchief. But 
 stop ! One of the boys is coming in to see Mr. 
 Andrews, his teacher. 
 
EYES AND NO EYES. 7 
 
 "Well, Robert, whither have you been walking this 
 afternoon?" asked Mr. Andrews, as the lad entered 
 his room at the close of a holiday. 
 
 "I have been, sir, to Brown Heath," replied Rob- 
 ert, "and around by the windmill on Camp Mount, 
 and home through the meadows by the river." 
 
 "Well, that is a pleasant round," said Mr. Andrews. 
 
 "I thought it very dull, sir," said Robert. "I 
 scarcely met with a single person. I had rather by 
 half have gone by the turnpike road." 
 
 "Why yes, if seeing men and horses were your ob- 
 ject, you would indeed have been entertained on the 
 high-road. But did you see William?" 
 
 "We set out together," answered Robert, "but he 
 lagged behind in the lane ; so I walked on and left 
 him." 
 
 "That was a pity," Mr. Andrews said. "He 
 would have been company for you." 
 
 " O, he is so tedious, always stopping to look at 
 this thing and that," said Robert, impatiently. "I had 
 rather walk alone. I dare say he has not yet got 
 home." 
 
 "Here he comes! Well, William, where have you 
 been?" asked Mr. Andrews of the boy who had lagged 
 behind. 
 
 "O sir, the pleasantest walk!" answered William. 
 
 "I went all over the Brown Heath, and so on up 
 to the mill at the top of the hill, .and then down among 
 the meadows by the side of the river." 
 
 "Why, that is just the round Robert has been tak- 
 ing," exclaimed Mr. Andrews, "and he complains of 
 its dullness-, and prefers the high-road." 
 
8 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 "I wonder at that," said William. "I am sure I 
 hardly took a step that did not delight me, and I have 
 brought home my handkerchief full of curiosities." 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 " SUPPOSE, then, you give us some account of what 
 amused you so much. I fancy it will be as new to 
 Robert as to me," suggested Mr. Andrews. 
 
 "I will, sir," said William, cheerfully. "On the 
 road leading to the Heath, I spied a thing curious 
 enough, in the hedge. It was an old crab-tree out of 
 which grew a great branch of something green, quite 
 different from the tree itself. Here is a branch of it." 
 
 "Ah!" exclaimed Mr. Andrews, "this is the mistle- 
 toe, a plant of great fame on account of the use made 
 of it by the Druids of old in their religious rites. It 
 is one of those plants which do not grow in the ground 
 by a root of their own, but fix themselves upon other 
 plants; whence it is styled a parasite." 
 
 "A little further on," continued William, "! saw 
 a green woodpecker fly to a tree, and run up the trunk 
 like a cat. What beautiful birds they are ! When I 
 got upon the open heath, how charming it was! The 
 air seemed so fresh, and the prospect so free and wide ! 
 Then it was all covered with gay flowers, many of 
 which I had never seen before. I saw several birds 
 that were new to me. There was a flock of lapwings 
 that amused me much. As I came near, some of 
 them kept flying round and round just over my head, 
 and crying pee-wit, so distinctly one might almost fancy 
 they spoke. I thought I should have caught one of 
 
EYES AND NO EYES. 9 
 
 them, for he flew as though one of his wings was 
 broken, and often tumbled close to the ground. But 
 as I came near, he always made a shift to get away." 
 
 "Ha, ha!" interrupted Mr. Andrews, laughing, 
 "you were finely taken in, then. This was an arti- 
 fice of the bird's to entice you away from its nest ; for 
 they build upon the bare ground, and their nests 
 would be easily observed did they not draw off the 
 attention of those who disturb them by their loud 
 cries and pretended lameness." 
 
 "I wish I had known that," said William, "for the 
 bird led me a long chase, often over shoes in water. 
 However, it was the cause of my falling in with an 
 old man and a boy who were cutting and piling turf 
 for fuel ; and I had a good talk with them about the 
 manner of preparing the turf, and the price it sells at. 
 I then took my course up to the windmill on the 
 mount. What a wide prospect ! I counted fifteen 
 church steeples. From the hill I went straight down 
 to the meadows below, and walked on the side of a 
 brook that runs into the river. There were a great 
 many dragon-flies all about the stream. I caught one 
 of the finest, and have 'got him in a leaf. But how I 
 longed to catch a bird that I saw hovering over the 
 water, and that, every now and then, darted down into 
 it ! It was all over a mixture of the most beautiful 
 green and blue, with some orange color." 
 
 "I can tell you what that bird was," said Mr. An- 
 drews. "It was a kingfisher, the celebrated halcyon 
 of the ancients, about which so many tales are told." 
 
 "There were a great many swallows, too, sporting 
 upon the surface of the water," continued William. 
 
IO LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 ''Sometimes they dashed into the stream; sometimes 
 they pursued one another so quickly that the eye 
 could scarcely keep up with them. A little further 
 along, I saw a man in a boat catching eels. While I 
 was looking at him, a heron came flying over my 
 head with large, flapping wings. After I had left the 
 meadow, I crossed the cornfields on the way to our 
 house, and passed close to a marl pit. I picked up 
 a piece of marl which was quite full of shells; but 
 how sea-shells could get there, I can not imagine." 
 
 "What a number of new ideas this afternoon's 
 walk has afforded you! " exclaimed Mr. Andrews. '"I 
 do not wonder that you found it amusing; it has been 
 very instructive, too. Did you see nothing of these 
 sights, Robert?" 
 
 "I saw some of them," answered Robert, "but I 
 did not take particular notice of them." 
 
 "Why not? " asked Mr. Andrews. 
 
 "I don't know," Robert answered. "I did not 
 care about them, and I made the best of my way 
 home." 
 
 "That would have been right," remarked Mr. An- 
 drews, "if you had been sent on an errand; but as 
 you walked only for amusement, it would have been 
 wise to seek out as many sources of it as possible. 
 But so it is. One man walks through the world with 
 his eyes open, and another with his eyes shut; and 
 upon this difference depends the superiority of knowl- 
 edge the one has over the other. I have known sail- 
 ors who have been in all quarters of the globe, and 
 who could tell you nothing but the signs of the tip- 
 pling houses they visited in different ports, and the 
 
A BUSY SKELETON. II 
 
 quality and price of the liquor. On the other hand, 
 a Franklin could not cross the channel without making 
 some observations useful to mankind ; while many a 
 thoughtless youth is whirled throughout Europe with- 
 out gaining a single idea worth crossing a street for. 
 The observing eye and the inquiring mind find im- 
 provement and delight in every ramble in town or 
 country. 
 
 "Do you, then, William, continue to make use of 
 your eyes ; and you, Robert, learn that eyes were 
 given you to use." 
 
 2. A BUSY SKELETON. 
 
 WHEN girls and boys are called upon to write out 
 their own thoughts, they, are sometimes puzzled to 
 find subjects for this useful and charming exercise. 
 Perhaps they look too far away. The best subjects 
 are near at hand. Here is one, for example: "The 
 school history of a sponge." This airy, thirsty com- 
 panion of the slate has had an eventful experience. 
 Think over what it has done from the time it was tied 
 to some particular slate down to the moment when it 
 was abandoned for the rubber 'eraser, and when the 
 slate was put aside for the paper tablet. 
 
 The sponge has been a most useful servant, though 
 its work is peculiar. The pencil creates ; the sponge 
 destroys. It is an excellent destroyer. How often 
 young brains have toiled hard, and small fingers have 
 worked wearily to build castles and pyramids of fig- 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Sponge Fishing. 
 
 ures which the sponge, with a 
 single stroke, has wiped out of 
 existence ! 
 
 The sponge is always a friend 
 to cleanliness. It helps to for- 
 get mistakes, and in this way 
 soothes wounded feelings. It has 
 wiped out a great many wrongs 
 wrong figures, wrong answers, 
 wrong writing, wrong spelling, 
 and innumerable scrawls and 
 awkward pictures which thought- 
 less pencils have inscribed upon 
 the abused surface of the slate. 
 It would comfort us if we could 
 as easily and completely erase 
 the marks of our wrong deeds 
 from ourselves and from others. 
 
 Perhaps it has never occurred 
 to the girls and boys who have 
 so often used the sponge to cleanse 
 their slates and their reputations, 
 
A BUSY SKELETON. 13 
 
 that they were handling a skeleton. Ordinarily a skel- 
 eton is considered a disagreeable thing for a compan- 
 ion ; but the sponge is a skeleton as truly as if it were 
 the naked bones of a fish or a cat. And this starts 
 up another thought about the sponge. Our work in 
 the world must be done while we are alive ; after we 
 die, our bones are useless. The sponge, while it lives, 
 does no work except tp take its food. When it dies 
 its usefulness begins. Then it is that its skeleton, not 
 only in the school-room, but in many of the world's 
 arts, becomes a busy, useful, durable helper. 
 
 It may now occur to the reader who has never be- 
 fore thought of it, that the natural history of the 
 sponge may be even more interesting than its school 
 history. What is the sponge ? will be an attractive 
 question to answer, after describing the different kinds 
 of sponges and how they are obtained. 
 
 The men in the picture represent Dalmatians. They 
 are fishing for sponges. From these hints it is easy 
 to conclude that sponges live in water, and in a par- 
 ticular body of water which may be found by consult- 
 ing the map. Do not, however, rashly conclude that 
 sponges are fishes. Oysters and pearls are said to be 
 ' 'fished," yet no one should really think they are 
 fishes. 
 
 There are sponges which live in fresh water, but 
 they are not the kind which we are now speaking of. 
 The useful sponges come from the shores of the Med- 
 iterranean and Red seas, from the Florida coast, and 
 from the Bahama Islands. There are three principal 
 kinds of sponges that are gathered for sale. The large 
 horse or bath sponge is from the Mediterranean and 
 
14 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 the Bahamas. The second kind includes the zimocca 
 of the Mediterranean, and the yellow, or hard-head 
 sponges of American waters. These are all dense, 
 thick, and hard. The third kind is the finest, softest, 
 and most delicate of all, and is the Turkish toilet 
 sponge. 
 
 The men in the boat are supposed to be fishing with 
 a five-pronged spear or harpoon. The water must be 
 very quiet to enable them to see their game fifty or 
 sixty feet below the surface. The most ancient way 
 of getting sponges was by diving. To this method 
 the Greek sponge-fishers were trained from childhood. 
 The diver had a stone slab fastened to his feet, and 
 the end of a long rope tied about his waist. A net, 
 or game-bag, to hold the sponges, was hung from his 
 neck. When he reached the bottom, he snatched all 
 the sponges he could see and quickly grasp ; then he 
 pulled on his rope to announce that he was ready, and 
 was lifted to the boat. Sometimes, after descending 
 to the depth of a hundred feet or more, the diver 
 would reach the surface in a swoon and bleeding at 
 the nose. 
 
 One method by which sponges are now gathered is 
 by dredging or scraping the bottom of the shallow sea- 
 coast with a net. The Greeks, however, use the div- 
 ing dress. This, in appearance, is something like the 
 ancient coat of mail. It is air-tight and incloses the 
 whole body, covering the head in a helmet in which 
 are windows for the eyes to look through. This 
 helmet is joined by a rubber hose which reaches to a 
 boat on the 'surface of the water. A pump forces 
 fresh air through the hose to the diver below. 
 
A BUSY SKELETON. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 Is. the sponge a plant or an animal ? Looking at it 
 as it sits on the bottom, one might reasonably take it 
 for a sort of mushroom, or cabbage-head. Ever since 
 sponges came into use, and until within a few years, 
 they have been regarded as vegetables. There are 
 still thousands of people who believe them to be marine 
 plants ; for the common impression is that all animals 
 move about. 
 
 The sponge is a real animal. This fact was found 
 out, as thousands of wonders in nature have been 
 brought to light, by indus- 
 trious search, and by the use 
 of sharp eyes. It was dis- 
 covered that small pieces 
 were somehow separated 
 from the living sponge, and 
 that these chips floated away, 
 and began to grow and move. 
 Eggs were also found in 
 sponges ; and from eggs come 
 animals. The little chips 
 and pieces of wool that 
 hatched from the eggs soon throw out long, slender 
 hairs which move like oars, and paddle the tiny animal 
 from place to place. 
 
 Without eyes and without ears, the little sailor feels 
 its way about in the deep watery world by means of 
 its hair legs. It will run against plants and rocks, as 
 a blindfolded child in the game encounters chairs and 
 
 Young Sponge. 
 
1 6 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 tables. Then it paddles around the obstacle, and 
 shoves itself away into the free water, asking help of 
 nobody. 
 
 By and by this homeless infant settles down on the 
 sea-bottom with its mouth if a simple hole can be 
 called a mouth against the place where it is to be 
 fixed. It spreads out a thin, flat membrane which 
 drives out the water beneath it, and then it is held 
 down by the weight of the water above. Here it 
 grows into the little cavities of the bottom, attaches 
 itself firmly, becomes an adult sponge, and ever after 
 remains fixed, or until some fisherman lays his hand or 
 spear upon it. 
 
 Far more absurd than the little waif with thread-like 
 legs is the stationary animal now to be explained. It 
 has no head, no tail, no legs, no arms, no eyes, no 
 ears, no real mouth, no stomach, no heart, no lungs, 
 no true blood. It never moves from its place, and yet 
 it is alive. It can not go in search of food, but expects 
 food to come in search of it. Fortunately, the rolling, 
 restless sea takes care of it. There is afloat in some 
 waters a mass of minute vegetables and animals so 
 small as to be seen only with the microscope. These 
 are the food brought to the sedentary sponge by the 
 motherly waves. 
 
 The living sponge, like the living human body, has 
 its hard parts and its soft parts. The hard parts of 
 our bodies are chiefly bone ; taken together, we call 
 them the skeleton. The hard parts of the sponge are 
 this porous, springy article which is used on the slate 
 and in the bath. This is its skeleton ; and it is made 
 of fine, horny fibers. The soft parts of the animal 
 
A BUSY SKELETON. I/ 
 
 have been removed from it. They are a jelly-like sub- 
 stance which lines all the holes and pores of the skel- 
 eton. Over the outside of the sponge is a thin, net-like 
 membrane, which opens and closes the canals that run 
 their crooked course from the middle of the .sponge to 
 its surface. 
 
 Opening and closing its' many holes, to let in and 
 throw out food, is about all the work the living sponge 
 does. The floating food is admitted into a large num- 
 ber of tubes or canals, and is carried through a thou- 
 sand or more cavities which take up the food and di- 
 gest it. After the nourishment of the food has been 
 received, the useless matter is carried out through the 
 porous canals, and expelled at the surface of the 
 sponge. 
 
 On the water-bottoms sponges show all sorts of 
 forms. Some seem to be made of glass threads. Some 
 are flat like sheets. Others are like clumps or small 
 bushes ; still others resemble vases. 
 
 When they are brought to the surface by the men 
 and boys who fish for them, the sponges are thrown 
 into tanks of water, after which decay soon begins. 
 Then they are taken out and all the soft, or what was 
 living matter, is beaten out of them. After this the 
 skeletons are dried, and are ready for market. When 
 they reach the first market-center they are further 
 cleaned, are cut into regular shapes, and are sometimes 
 bleached by the use of chemicals. The sponge trade 
 at the principal European market amounts to nearly a 
 million dollars annually. 
 
 Such is a short, natural history of a busy skeleton, 
 
 or of a bucket full of holes that never leaks. 
 L. c.- 2 . 
 
1 8 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 3 JEWEL-MAKERS AND ISLAND BUILDERS. 
 
 FIFTY years ago, a pretty ornament in the dress of 
 a young 'lady was a necklace made of red coral. 
 From the same material cameos were cut, and ear-rings 
 and brooches were made. These jewels were, at one 
 time, expensive. The finest rose-tinted coral was val- 
 ued at six hundred dollars an ounce. And in those 
 days, when coral ornaments were so popular, there 
 were at Algeria alone, engaged in coral fisheries, more 
 than three thousand men. 
 
 Sprig of Tree- coral Enlarged. 
 
 Now something very strange has happened, and 
 coral jewelry is worth scarcely any thing. Men have 
 invented to take its place something which is a per- 
 fect imitation of both ivory and coral. They call it 
 celluloid. It is made of cotton melted with chemicals 
 and pressed into bars or thin sheets, and often colored 
 with attractive tints. Of it are formed useful articles, 
 such as knife handles and eye-glass frames, and various 
 other things used for ornament. This new cotton 
 jewelry has destroyed the old-time precious value of 
 .coral. 
 
 For a long time even learned men believed coral to 
 be a plant. After closer examination they concluded 
 
JEWEL- MAKERS AND ISLAND BUILDERS. \Q 
 
 that it was part plant and part animal. Still later 
 coral was declared to be manufactured by insects ; and 
 many people at the present time speak of the " coral 
 insect." 
 
 Coral is not a plant, nor is it an animal-plant. It is 
 not manufactured by an insect or by any other ani- 
 mal. The living coral, as it is found in the sea, is an 
 animal, and the dead coral in the necklace is a part 
 of the skeleton of a once living coral. Here, then, is 
 an animal a little like the sponge. It is stationary, 
 or fixed to a particular place. It is a little higher grade 
 of animal than the sponge ; for, while it has no eyes, 
 ears, nose, or legs, it has a simple mouth, a stomach, 
 and something like feet, all of which the sponge does 
 not possess. 
 
 The preceding illustration presents an object quite 
 like a flower. It is a sprig of a kind of coral that 
 branches out like a tree. No wonder .people once 
 thought the coral a plant. The petals or leaves of 
 the flower, however, are the feelers or feeders of the 
 animal. They are called tentacles. They have also 
 been regarded as feet ; and because there are many of 
 them the animal was named a polyp, which means 
 many-footed. Some kinds of polyps are produced from 
 eggs, and for a while swim about. 
 
 The hole in the middle of the flower is the mouth. 
 The petal-like tentacles move ; and, when the proper 
 food floats within reach, they grasp it and turn it into 
 the mouth. From the mouth the food passes into the 
 stomach, from which the nourishment is sent to every 
 part of the polyp, while the useless matter is thrown 
 out again at the mouth. When danger approaches, 
 
2O LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 the tentacles fold in like the petals of a morning-glory, 
 and close the mouth. 
 
 From the food which it takes, the soft part of the 
 polyp is grown, and the hard part, or coral, is pro- 
 duced precisely as our flesh and bones are made from 
 
 the things we eat. Only, in 
 the case of the coral animal, 
 too much of the stony bone 
 is produced, and the living 
 polyp is constantly growing 
 up, and leaving the hard skel- 
 eton behind as a dead stem. 
 A bud puts forth near the 
 base of the polyp, and soon 
 another animal blossoms out 
 
 Red Coral Magnified. w j th petals Qr tentades 
 
 So the budding and blossoming of these flower-ani- 
 mals goes on until many polyps, together with the 
 dead stems of coral that support them, make a branch 
 like the twig of a tree ; or they crowd into a clump 
 like a half-round stone, or a plum-pudding. One of 
 these clump-like corals covers its surface with starry 
 flower forms. Another appears like a round mass of 
 human brains, and is called brain-coral. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 How the beautiful corals of the Mediterranean Sea 
 get their delicate pink, and rich, red tints, can not be 
 known, as no one can tell how roses acquire their 
 charming colors. By growing stems or skeletons of 
 such fine texture and attractive hues, coral polyps may 
 
JEWEL-MAKERS AND ISLAND BUILDERS. 
 
 21 
 
 be justly called jewelers of the sea. But some kinds of 
 coral animals do even a greater thing than to prepare 
 their bodies to adorn a maiden's neck ; they pile their 
 skeletons in such vast heaps and so high, that islands 
 are formed upon which trees grow, and animals, and 
 even men, live. The Bermuda Islands in the Atlantic 
 are raised on coral beds ; and coral reefs are thrown 
 out around the Florida coasts. 
 The most interesting of coral 
 islands are in the Pacific Ocean. 
 
 The island builders, though 
 too coarse and dull in their hard 
 parts to answer for ornaments, 
 are none the less beautiful in 
 their forms. They live in trop- 
 ical waters which never grow 
 colder than summer warmth. 
 They can not live in a depth 
 of water greater than about one 
 hundred and eighty feet. How, 
 then, can they rear islands from 
 the bottom of the sea ? 
 
 Geography tells us that on 
 the sea-bottom rest hills and mountains like the eleva- 
 tions which rise on the dry land. Some of these 
 mountains are very lofty, and upon them are caught 
 and gathered immense quantities of dead shells, and 
 rubbish that floats in the ocean. In this way these 
 mountains lift their heads higher and higher; and 
 when one of them comes within two hundred feet of 
 the surface, the coral polyps begin to fasten upon it, 
 and to make it their home. 
 
 Reef-coral and Polyp. 
 
22 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Here they live and multiply, fed, like the sponge, 
 by the surging waters ; and they climb up on the 
 ever dying skeletons of those that have lived before 
 them, until they reach the surface. All this time, 
 which must be a very great many years, the dashing 
 of the water has constantly broken and crumbled the 
 coral, so that the holes and cracks have been filled, 
 and the wall is solid. 
 
 The little flower-animals, some of which are exceed- 
 ingly small, love to throw out their petal-tentacles in 
 the free, rushing water, where their food is most 
 abundant. This leads them to crowd to the edge of 
 the island, so that when their work, which is called a 
 reef, reaches the surface of the water, it is in the 
 shape of a ring or a horseshoe. In the middle of 
 the ring is a quiet lake, called a lagoon. 
 
 When the reef rises near to the surface of the water, 
 the corals begin a rough experience. Then they crum- 
 ble and break off by the force of the waves that dash 
 over them, and are heaped up above the level of the 
 water. The waves grind the surface into soil. Seeds 
 are wafted from far distant shores and find this soil. 
 Trees and flowers grow ; and could you ascend with 
 the eagle and look down, you would see this coral 
 reef lying like a leafy wreath on the bosom of the 
 ocean, beautiful, strong, but made of skeletons. 
 
 Somehow birds find these lonely coral islands of the 
 Pacific. On one of them, where no human beings 
 dwell, Professor Dana, of Yale, found multitudes of 
 birds who had no fear of man. No hunters with 
 noisy guns had ever disturbed their peace. No heart- 
 less boys had broken their eggs or snatched away their 
 
AMONG THE SHELLS. 23 
 
 
 
 young. He plucked them from the branches as one 
 picks fruit. "And many a songster," he says, ''lost 
 a tail-feather as it sat perched upon a branch, appar- 
 ently unconscious that the world contained an enemy. " 
 
 4. AMONG THE SHELLS. 
 
 FEW eyes that read these lines have never seen 
 shells. They abound in nearly all waters and in the 
 moist places of the land. The surf of the ocean and 
 the waves of the lakes wash them upon the beach. 
 They lie on the bottoms of ponds and rivers, hide in 
 gutters and gardens, and show their white whorls by 
 the roadside. Some of the great rocks are made of 
 myriads of minute shells that once covered soft, living 
 animals. 
 
 If those who Jive in the crowded city have never 
 seen these creatures in their natural haunts, they may 
 find them in temporary boarding places. In some 
 eating-houses there are at certain seasons large piles 
 of oysters dripping with melting ice. These are usu- 
 ally alive until they are forced open. The half shell 
 with its white lining and black center-spot may be 
 easily obtained. The pearl-lined clam shells have often 
 served little girls for dishes, as they served savages 
 thousands of years ago. 
 
 Then there are pearl buttons, knife handles, and 
 card-cases in show-windows, and jewelry set with 
 rare pearls glistening in show-cases. All these may 
 be seen and enjoyed' without cost. Who ever stops. 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 to think that they are somehow related to the oys- 
 ter? Yes, these pretty objects in the show-case have 
 come from shell-animals, the story of whose birth and 
 life is well worth reading. 
 
 To make the story more real and impressive, get 
 some shells and study them. You may play with them 
 and yet know little about them. I have seen little girls 
 on the clean beach of the lake shore gathering with 
 
AMONG THE SHELLS. 2$ 
 
 delight the small, conical shells which they are taught 
 to call periwinkles. Are they periwinkles? Quite 
 different from them are the periwinkles described by 
 Charles Dickens in some of his stories. These are 
 shell-animals which poor people gather at the salt 
 water, and after cooking them, pick out the meat with 
 a crooked pin. 
 
 It would be absurd to say that boys in the country, 
 especially if they are near creeks or rivers, can not 
 find fresh-water clams or mussels. A little wading in 
 shallow water tempered by the sun may be required ; 
 but wading is not a great trial to the average boy. 
 Snails anybody may find. Empty snail shells abound, 
 which may be examined without and within to see 
 how curiously they are wrought. Living snails may 
 be captured in their hiding places. 
 
 With these shell-animals in hand, something may be 
 learned. The oyster and the sea-clam will not perform 
 before their captors, they are so shy. With a strong 
 knife, however, they may be easily opened, if one 
 knows how to do it. The fresh-water clam, if laid in 
 water, will probably open its shell. The snail, when 
 placed in a shallow dish and surrounded by tepid water, 
 will come out of its twisted house. 
 
 Something common to all these animals may now 
 be learned ; namely, they live in hard shells and their 
 bodies are entirely soft. A good way to prove that 
 clams and oysters are soft is to eat them. They could 
 not slip so easily over the tongue if they had bones. 
 Now for these, and for all their soft, shell-covered 
 cousins, we have a convenient word. They are called 
 mollusks. This is a good name for soft things, you 
 
26 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 will say, when you remember that when a hard piece 
 of leather or a rough temper is softened, it is said to 
 be mollified. 
 
 Something further must be observed. The shells 
 of the fresh-water clam, the salt-water clam, and the 
 oyster open like a book with a hinge at its back. 
 Break the hinge and there are two shells nearly alike. 
 The snail shell can not be opened in this way. It is 
 single, and looks as if it had been whirled or twisted. 
 
 It is plain that, besides protecting them against vio- 
 lence, these shells are designed in part to shut the 
 water out and to shut the soft animals, or mol- 
 lusks, in. Opening and closing perfectly light, they 
 act like the valves of a pump. They are, there- 
 fore, called valves. The clam, mussel, and oyster, 
 having two shells, are called bi-valves. The snail 
 and its kin, having but one shell, are called uni-valves. 
 There is a long list of shell animals that are clam-like, 
 and a long and brilliant one that are snail-like. 
 
 5. THE CLAM. 
 
 ABOUT the year 1626, John Smith, the founder of 
 Virginia and the author of the charming story of 
 Pocahontas, wrote a book about his adopted country. 
 In this book he describes the natural attractions of 
 Virginia ; and among other good things, he mentions 
 the mollusk which is the subject of this chapter. 
 "You shall scarce find," says he, ''any bay or shallow 
 
THE CLAM. 
 
 shore, or cove of sand, where you may not take many 
 clamps." This shows that the clam was once called a 
 clamp an appropriate name, as we shall see. 
 
 The long clam and the round clam are those which 
 John Smith referred to. Sometimes these animals may 
 be found with their valves open. In this condition, 
 should a finger be inserted into the opening, the two 
 valves of the shell will instant- 
 ly close ; and if the finger is 
 caught, its owner will know by 
 experience that the clam is a 
 clamp a very close pinching 
 clamp. Oysters are still more 
 severe pinchers; hence they 
 might also have been named 
 clamps. 
 
 To speak intelligently of 
 the clam, its various parts 
 must be named. The two 
 half shells have already been 
 called valves. Looking at the 
 figure, the thick edge of the closed shell is the back 
 (b). Each of the knobs on the back is called an umbo ; 
 together they are called umbones. Between the um- 
 bones on the back is the hinge. The sharp edge 
 is the ventral edge (v). The large end of the whole 
 shell is the front end (/); and the smaller end is the 
 rear end (r). Holding the shell with its back up and 
 the rear end toward you, the valve on the right-hand 
 side is the right valve, and the other is the left valve. 
 The largest half shell of the oyster is always the left 
 valve, and lies downward. 
 
 Long Clam. 
 
28 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The long clam burrows in the sand, as John Smith 
 intimated. How a shell can do such work could never 
 be guessed if it were always found closed. Here then 
 is a picture of the clam in action 
 precisely as it works in the sand. 
 Its front end is down, its rear 
 end is up. But what is the long 
 thing sticking up, and the short- 
 er thing sticking down? The 
 former is called the neck, and 
 the latter the foot. Leaving the 
 neck to be described further on, 
 let us look at this foot. 
 
 A remarkable member is the 
 foot. It never walks. It only 
 digs ; and it digs so rapidly, that 
 one trying to catch this clam with 
 a hoe must work briskly, or the 
 foot will bore its hole in the sand 
 faster than the hoe can uncover 
 it. The fresh-water clam, or mus- 
 sel, uses its foot for furrowing or 
 plowing the bottom, but never 
 for burrowing. Besides acting as 
 a spade or auger, this foot carries 
 the ear of the clam. At the 
 slightest noise, the foot and neck 
 are drawn in, and the shell is 
 ciam m Action. c l os ed. There is another and 
 
 still stranger thing about the clam's foot. It is close 
 by the brains of the animal. Therefore Rev. Mr. 
 Lockwood pleasantly says of the long clam's brother, 
 
THE CLAM. 29 
 
 the fresh-water mussel, or river-clam, "the mussel's 
 brain is at the base of the understanding, that is, ex- 
 actly under the foot." 
 
 To understand the clam animal, we must look 
 within its shell. This is opened by running a knife- 
 blade between the valves. How monkeys and apes 
 on the wild coast open them without knives, we are 
 not informed. The ancients tell a story of monkeys 
 watching the clam or oyster until it opened itself, and 
 then inserting a little stone to prevent its closing. 
 
 The knife, when used for this purpose, must pass 
 within, and along the back, and cut two tough straps 
 that hold the valves together. Then the shell will 
 open on its hinge, and the two valves will lie back like 
 the two covers of a book. Now we have the book 
 opened, (page 31), and we must see what it contains. 
 
 Laying aside the right cover or valve, here is the 
 soft animal lying on its bed of pearl in the left valve. 
 The first thing to notice is a slippery, filmy cloak 
 which wraps the animal as a water-proof sometimes 
 wraps a school-girl. This leathery cloak is called the 
 mantle. In its edge (e) is the sense of feeling; quite 
 likely, also, the sense of sight. 
 
 Lay back the mantle, and there is exposed the foot 
 (/) now drawn in. At the rear end is the long, ex- 
 tended neck which includes two tubes, or siphons. 
 The siphons of the fresh-water clam are not joined, 
 and extend at different points in the shell. Through 
 the lower tube (Y) the water flows in to feed the clam. 
 Through the upper tube (<?) the same water passes out 
 after the animal has used the food it contains. 
 
 Those who dig for clams on the sea coast, find out 
 
3<D LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 what this siphon is for. Often the active little mol- 
 lusk, as it burrows away from the hoe, throws a stream 
 of water into the face of the digger. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 HUNT around now for the mouth. You might ex- 
 pect it to be near the end of the neck, where most ani- 
 mals have their mouths. But no ; it is at the opposite 
 end of the clam, not far from the foot. It is only an 
 opening (m). The clam has no teeth, no tongue, in 
 fact no head. Away up under the hinge is its heart 
 (//). Its food consists of animals and plants floating 
 in the water. These are invisible except through the 
 microscope. 
 
 The water that enters by the inflowing siphon (i) 
 carries this food to the mouth (in). As the water, 
 which carries air as well as food, flows toward the 
 mouth, it passes over the gills (g) by which the clam 
 breathes ; for clams must breathe. There are four of 
 these gills, and they are filled with small, thin tubes 
 into which the cold, white blood of the clam flows, 
 and takes the air from the water on its way to the 
 mouth. 
 
 The gills do for the clam what the lungs do for the 
 reader, as is simply explained in the little book en- 
 titled, "The House I Live In." The smelling nerve 
 of the clam is not far from where the siphon joins the 
 g;lls (#). It is used to detect the character of the 
 water which flows to the gills. 
 
 It is rather strange to find the mouth of an animal 
 at one end, and the neck and nose at the opposite end ; 
 
THE CLAM. 31 
 
 but any absurd thing may be expected in a creature 
 whose ears and brains are about its foot. Still another 
 fact is brought to light through the microscope. For 
 both air and food, the clam must have an almost con- 
 stant stream of water running into it ; and to carry 
 away the food it rejects, and the impurities of its 
 blood, it must have a steady stream going out. 
 
 To keep the water moving both in and out, the in- 
 side of the siphon is covered with minute hairs which, 
 by constant motion like- little paddles, pull and push 
 
 Fig. I. Showing the Clam -within the Shell. 
 
 the water along. The gills are covered by these hair 
 paddles. The mouth is surrounded by them, and all 
 together they keep the water in motion. In the out- 
 flowing siphon the same kind of hairs work the other 
 way, and move the waste water out. 
 
 What now is meant by the saying, " As happy as a 
 clam"? Like the sponge, the clam never goes in 
 search of food. The food must come to the clam. 
 When the ocean tide is out, the clam is left in its hole 
 on the dry beach. It grows hungry during the six 
 hours of low tide. Up near to the top of the hole it 
 
32 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 rises, and stretches out its siphon for the first ripple 
 of food-laden water, as a child holds out its hand for 
 bread. 
 
 Very likely, too, it puts out its foot with a rude ear 
 on it, to catch the music of the advancing surf as the 
 tide creeps up the beach. By and by it comes the 
 richly freighted water with the joy of fresh air and 
 fresh food in every drop ; and the clam is happy. The 
 entire proverb, therefore, is, ' ' As happy as a clam in 
 high water." 
 
 6. THE CLAM'S SHELL. 
 
 THE shell is an admirable house for a body so soft, 
 without a bone in it, and absolutely defenseless. So 
 strong is it tjiat a heavy weight will not crush it. So 
 hard is it that the horny bill of a fish-hawk can not 
 penetrate it. When they want to break the shell of 
 a mollusk, birds are wont to take it in the beak, and, 
 flying to a considerable height, to let it fall upon a 
 rock. Besides being strong and tight when closed, 
 the shell is lined with a pearly and perfectly smooth 
 surface for the delicate mantle to lie upon. 
 
 It is now known how the clam's shell grows. The 
 same sea-water that furnishes lime for the skeleton of 
 the coral, carries lime for the shell of the mollusk. 
 The river and the creek also contain this material. It 
 might be supposed that the shell would somehow grow, 
 and then the tender mollusk would in some way be 
 born within it. The contrary, however, is true. The 
 
THE CLAM S SHELL. 
 
 33 
 
 mollusk is hatched from an egg, and is surrounded by 
 its mantle. This mantle has the wonderful power of 
 taking or secreting lime from the water and turning it 
 into hard shell. 
 
 The shell begins to grow at the hinge, and increases 
 as fast as the animal grows. The manner of this 
 growth is like that of shingling a roof backwards from 
 the ridge to the eaves. First, one little circular layer 
 of shell is made at the hinge. Then as the animal 
 grows, another still larger layer or shingle pushes out 
 from under the first. And so on, as show r n in Fig. 3, 
 each bit of growth leaving its definite line on the out- 
 side of the shell, while the inside is spread over with 
 a polished coat of pearl. 
 
 This is the place to speak of the way in which the 
 clam opens and closes its shell. Suppose, as in the 
 figures, two shells cut 
 through both valves 
 so as to take a cross 
 slice or section from 
 each. The pieces will 
 then show the way in 
 which the layers of 
 growth have been add- 
 ed, each one extend- 
 ing from under the 
 preceding one. They also show the contrivances for 
 opening and closing the shell in the salt-water clam 
 and in the fresh-water clam, or mussel. 
 
 If you put a piece of rubber inside a book close 
 to its hinge, the book may be closed by pressing the 
 covers together, but it will not stay shut, because the 
 
 L. C.-3. 
 
 Fig. 2. 
 Section of Clam. 
 
 Fig-. 3. 
 Section of Mussel. 
 
34 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 rubber is elastic. Something like such a piece of 
 rubber is a ligament under the hinge of the salt-water 
 clam, as shown in Figure 2 (/). If you open a book 
 and fasten the covers open by a rubber strap running 
 over the outside of the back, you can only close it by 
 force, and then it will open again as soon as you let 
 it go. In the same way an elastic ligament on the 
 outside of the fresh-water clam (Fig. 3 /) draws the 
 valves open. In the salt-water clam the ligament pushes 
 the valves open, and in the fresh-water clam the liga- 
 ment pulls the valves open. 
 
 Little Neck Clam. 
 
 This is just what the clams want to make them 
 happy to be kept open without effort, so that the 
 nourishing water may always flow in. To close their 
 valves they must put forth an effort; and this is the 
 way they work. Inside the shell two strong muscles 
 pass from one valve to the other. One of these mus- 
 cles (m) is shown in each of the two figures just now 
 before us. It is called an adductor muscle, adductor 
 
SOME USES OF CLAMS. 35 
 
 meaning that which brings to. In the figure on page 
 31, the places of both the adductor muscles of the 
 clam are indicated (am). 
 
 It is easy to see why, when a clam is opened with 
 a knife, the knife must be passed along the valve near 
 the front and back ; this is to cut the two adductor 
 muscles. Even with one of these muscles the clam 
 will close its shell, as an omnibus driver shuts the door 
 of his carriage by his foot-strap. 
 
 A brother of the long clam is the round clam, some- 
 times called hard-shell, or little-neck-clam. Its awk- 
 ward foot is pushing out below and in front. It does 
 not dig, but hitches along by means of this foot. Its 
 short neck, or siphons, stretch out behind and above, 
 one with a fringe of hairs to paddle the water in, and 
 the other with the same kind of hairs to paddle the 
 water out. 
 
 7. SOME USES OF CLAMS. 
 
 THE largest of all shell animals is the giant-clam. 
 It is produced in tropical seas, and particularly in the 
 region of Sumatra. The famous Swedish naturalist 
 
 o 
 
 Linnaeus, who lived more than a hundred years ago, 
 describes one of these clams which weighed four hun- 
 dred and ninety-eight pounds. The mollusk within the 
 shell furnished a day's food for one hundred and 
 twenty men. So great was the strength of its muscle, 
 that by suddenly closing its valves it cut the cable of 
 a ship in two. 
 
36 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The giant-clam is valuable to the South Sea Island- 
 ers. Besides providing an important part of their 
 food, its valves are of great practical use. On some 
 of these islands stones are unknown. Here the na- 
 tives can not make stone weapons and implements as 
 did the savages of more favored regions ; hence the 
 giant-clam shell is a great blessing to them. From it 
 they make their knives, hammers, axes, and weapons 
 of war. 
 
 The giant-clam shell is convenient as a receptacle. 
 How immense it is ! Sir Joseph Banks, who accompa- 
 nied Capt. Cook on his voyage in 1768, possessed a 
 monster shell, one valve of which weighed two hundred 
 and twenty-two pounds, while the other valve weighed 
 two hundred and eighty-five pounds. 
 
 This shell is lined with a beautiful, white, pearl 
 coating; and when the rough exterior is removed, the 
 valve is something quite ornamental. Many years ago 
 a giant-clam shell was presented to the Church of St. 
 Sulpice in Paris. The valves of this shell are used to 
 contain the holy water. 
 
 A pleasant use of clams is observed in an old cus- 
 tom called the "New England Clam Bake." It ap- 
 pears that the savages who inhabited New England 
 from time immemorial, were accustomed to gather at 
 the sea-shore for great clam feasts. Both claim and 
 oysters, as any one might conclude, cease to hold their 
 valves together the moment they begin to be cooked. 
 Therefore it was easy for Indians, who had no knives, 
 to open their shell fish by heat. 
 
 The modern clam bake, which is observed at several 
 points on the coast, but particularly on the coast of 
 
SOME USES OF CLAMS. 
 
 37 
 
 Rhode Island, is quite closely copied from the feast of 
 the Indians. These natives were accustomed, on such 
 occasions, to invite to the assembly kings, chiefs, and 
 other dignitaries. In this respect, as well as in the 
 manner of roasting the bivalves, the custom of to-day 
 follows that of the savages. The clam bake brings 
 
 Indian Clam Bake. 
 
 together a large party of people, and quite often is 
 held in honor of distinguished persons, much like the 
 barbecue of the South, at which great people and small 
 people come together to feast ' upon ox, sheep, and 
 shote, roasted whole. 
 
 And this is the way the clam bake proceeds. A 
 
38 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 circular floor of stones, perhaps ten feet in diameter, 
 is laid on the beach. On this a fire is kindled and 
 fed until the stones are red hot. A layer of sea-weed 
 is spread on the stones, and upon this clams are placed 
 to a depth of two or three inches. Over these is scat- 
 tered another cover of sea-weed. Then comes a layer 
 of green corn in the husk, with potatoes and other 
 vegetables. After more sea-weed, dressed chickens 
 are added to the pile, and are often followed in the 
 same manner by oysters and lobsters. To make the 
 cooking more thorough and toothsome, a canvas or 
 tarpaulin, is stretched over the steaming heap. 
 
 8. THE OYSTER. 
 
 WHEN the oyster is laid open and placed by the side 
 of the clam or mussel, it is at once seen that the two 
 are in many points alike, and deserve to be called cous- 
 ins. The shell of the oyster is bivalve a book with 
 two covers and has the elastic ligament inside the 
 hinge to spring it open. Its shingly growth is readily 
 observed, but it is a rough, ugly looking shell. It 
 grows narrow near the hinge, and the left valve, from 
 holding fast to the sea-bottom, is much larger than the 
 right valve. 
 
 On the inside of the clam shell were pointed out 
 two spots, one at each end near the back, where were 
 attached the two strong adductor muscles which close 
 the shell. On the white lining of the oyster shell but 
 one such spot appears. It is of a dark purple color, 
 
THE OYSTER. 39 
 
 and is near the middle of the valve. The oyster has 
 but one adductor muscle, and this is an immensely 
 strong one. It joins the valves where the round pur- 
 ple spots appear. 
 
 The oyster animal is nearly like the clam animal. 
 It is entirely soft and without bones a true mollusk. 
 The same kind of a slippery mantle lies between it and 
 the inside of the shell, though this mantle does not 
 completely envelop the mollusk. The oyster has no 
 
 Oyster Shells. 
 
 foot. What does it want of a foot? It spends nearly 
 its whole life fastened to the bottom. Nature is very 
 economical, and would not bestow a foot where one can 
 not be used. 
 
 When the valves are open, the mantle sometimes 
 stretches down and throws its fringe beyond the lower 
 or ventral edge of the shell. In the border of the 
 mantle is the sense of touch; and here are the eyes, 
 if there are any ; and the ears are not far off. Oysters 
 close their valves at the slightest noise ; and a brush 
 of the hand over the water where they lie, when the 
 light is strong, will produce the same effect. Along 
 
40 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 the lower part of the shell lie the -four gill-plates with 
 which the animal breathes, or takes air from the water. 
 Above the gills is the adductor muscle. Try your 
 fork in it and see how hard it is. The oysterman 
 must cut this muscle before he can pry the valves 
 apart. He calls it the heart, but it is not a heart. 
 This latter organ, however, lies near by. It beats like 
 a human heart, only much slower from one to fifteen 
 throbs in a minute. At the front end of the gills is 
 the mouth of this headless animal. It is surrounded 
 by minute hairs, or cilia. When the oyster is open and 
 breathing, the cilia all along the gills and about the 
 mouth are in motion, pushing the water into the 
 mouth. 
 
 The oyster has a small friend which, until recently, 
 was thought to be an enemy. It is the oyster crab, a 
 greenish little creature when alive, but becoming red 
 when cooked. It is a dainty morsel, and was so re- 
 garded by George Washington.. This little visitor, 
 about a half inch in diameter, walks in and out of 
 the oyster's house at pleasure ; for strangely enough, 
 the door seems to be always open to her. Why 
 should the oyster, usually so 
 shy, admit this intruder? 
 
 It is found that the crab is a 
 messmate of the oyster, and 
 comes in to take her meals with 
 oyster crab. her hostess, Mrs. Oyster. The 
 
 inflowing water which feeds the 
 
 oyster feeds the crab. Then it is a very nice thing for 
 Crab to be inclosed in oyster castle, when hunted by 
 her fierce enemies. 
 
THE OYSTER, 4! 
 
 The oyster's food, like the clam's, includes minute 
 animals and plants visible only by the aid of the mi- 
 croscope. The same water which brings these contains 
 larger bodies which the oyster can not eat. This 
 coarser fare suits little Crab, who devours it in peace 
 and joy, dropping many fine crumbs which its hostess 
 relishes. So the presence of the crab is a benefit to 
 the oyster; and when it entertains a crab, the oyster is 
 likely to be plump and happy. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 To many people the oyster appears most interest- 
 ing when it lies on the half shell, or when it floats in 
 a milk-white stew, or when it gives forth the pleasant 
 odors of the frying pan. Thousands of years ago, sav- 
 age men found that oysters were good for food. On 
 the shore of the ocean, they have left immense heaps 
 of shells to testify to their fondness for these delicious 
 mollusks. At one point, on the coast of Maine, lies a 
 pile of these shells measuring eight million cubic feet. 
 Oysters in those far off years, as these remains show, 
 were twice as large as those of the present time. One 
 of them has been found which measured fifteen inches 
 in length. 
 
 The American people of to-day are great eaters of 
 oysters. In a single year, on our coasts, there are 
 taken and sold more than twenty-two million bushels 
 of these bivalves, making over six billions three hun- 
 dred millions of oysters, by count. Seventy-five millions 
 are exported to foreign countries, leaving more than 
 six billions to be eaten by Americans which figures 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 an average of at least a hundred oysters to each man, 
 woman, and child. This does not mean that each gets 
 his hundred. 
 
 How so many are produced and gathered will be an 
 interesting question to answer. The oyster is ready to 
 be eaten when it is about four or five years old. Like 
 
 Fig. 4. 
 
 Fig. 5. Fig. 
 
 Growth of Oyster from the Egg. 
 
 the chicken and the clam, it comes from an egg. 
 
 The mother oyster between the months of May 
 
 and September produces over nine millions Fig - 7 - 
 
 of eggs. After lying in the folds of the mantle for 
 
 a while, these eggs are sent into the water where the 
 
 wee things in them at once begin to grow. 
 
 The perfect egg, greatly magnified in the illustra- 
 tion, is a five hundredth part of an inch in diameter 
 (Fig. 4). When it is three hours old it assumes a 
 different shape (Fig. 5). When it begins to swim it is 
 called a "spat" (Fig. 6). It swims by the motion of 
 its cilia or hairs. When it is nearly ready to settle 
 upon the bottom (Fig. 7), the shell has begun to grow 
 from its mantle, and the cilia about where its head 
 would be, if it were fortunate enough to have a head, 
 are the paddles by which it scuds about. 
 
 Within six days from the time it left its mother's 
 mantle, the spat will- find a congenial place on the bot- 
 tom, fasten itself to an old oyster shell or an old boot, 
 and there remain for tbe rest of its life. Although such 
 
THE OYSTER. 43 
 
 an immense number of eggs is produced by a single 
 oyster, it is believed that not one in a million of eggs 
 ever comes to a full-grown mollusk. A single fish will 
 devour a million of eggs at a mouthful, to say nothing 
 of the poor, innocent little spats that make nice fish- 
 food. The mother herself swallows eggs without 
 knowing it. Still there are enough spats saved to 
 make our six billions of oysters. 
 
 In their natural state, oysters live and grow in beds. 
 These beds can only flourish in small bays, coves, and 
 inlets of the sea coast, protected from the fury of the 
 ocean waves and from storms. 
 The water must be neither too 
 cold nor too warm, and must 
 contain an abundance of mi- 
 croscopical food. The places 
 where spats are cradled and 
 reared, therefore, are neces- 
 sarily few. There are two 
 kinds of oyster beds, the nat- 
 ural and the artificial. In the 
 
 Oyster Seed. 
 
 natural beds, where the ani- 
 mals are left to themselves, they grow in heaps. The 
 spats fasten to the older oysters, and in separating 
 them there is much waste. 
 
 The artificial beds are those in which spats are col- 
 lected, and in which young oysters called "seeds" are 
 transplanted and grow for market. During the spawn- 
 ing season, near where the eggs or spawn of old oys- 
 ters are wont to drift, a bed is prepared for collecting 
 the spats. Oyster shells are usually thrown on 'the 
 bottom for the spats to fasten to, though the little 
 
44 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 swimmers will stick to a stone or to a piece of wood 
 or crockery. Forty of them will cleave to one oyster 
 shell. When they are as large as a quarter of a dollar 
 they are termed "seeds" or "blisters." 
 
 They may now be raked up and carried to empty 
 beds where they are scattered at the rate of a bushel 
 to about forty square feet. Here they grow for four 
 or five years, when they are ready for market. 
 
 9. OYSTER-CATCHING. 
 
 OYSTERS are caught by a bird called the oyster 
 catcher, by star-fish, soft crabs, drill-fish, and conchs. 
 All these plunder for their own benefit. Some of 
 them, as the star-fish, are very troublesome to the 
 growing beds, and the oystermen are accustomed, at 
 certain times of the year, to rake over the bed and 
 capture a multitude of these enemies. 
 
 Leaving all the remaining enemies mentioned to be 
 looked up in the Cyclopaedia, let us attend to one of 
 them, and see how a little sound knowledge is useful 
 in any kind of business. The star-fish, which belongs 
 to a lower branch of animals than the oyster, has its 
 mouth in the center from which the five arms radiate. 
 The arms are made of limestone sections joined by a 
 tough membrane, so that they can bend and grasp the 
 prey. They are also covered with sharp spines, and 
 on this account are not themselves a pleasant prey 
 for other animals. 
 
 The star-fish moves by filling ever so many little 
 
OYSTER-CATCHING. 
 
 45 
 
 tubes attached to its ray^ or arms. By placing the 
 tubes upon any surface and drawing the water from 
 them, they are made to stick fast, by suction. The 
 animal sometimes grows to a diameter of more than 
 two feet. He grasps the oyster in his five arms, and 
 by the suckers around his mouth breaks the thin edge 
 
 Oyster. Fleet. 
 
 of the shell. Then he runs into the shell the end of 
 his stomach, and sucks away all that part of the oyster 
 which he most relishes. The star-fish is to be com- 
 mended for his good taste. 
 
 Some years ago, oystermen were accustomed to catch 
 these depredators with tongs and dredges, and after 
 filling their boats, to break the star-fish in pieces and 
 throw the pieces overboard into the water. They did 
 not then know what they have since learned, that 
 many of the pieces of a star-fish will grow into com- 
 
4 6 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 plete animals. So that by dividing these mischievous 
 creatures they were only multiplying them. 
 
 The business of taking oysters for human use com- 
 mences in September, when the spawning is over and 
 the animals are plump. A sloop is brought to anchor 
 over the bed, and small boats containing men are sent 
 out in various directions. First, the oysters are taken 
 with double rakes or tongs, and are thrown into the 
 
 little boats which convey 
 them to the sloop. When 
 the rakes and tongs have" 
 done all they can, a dredge 
 is thrown out from the sloop 
 and dragged over the bot- 
 tom until the bed is thor- 
 oughly cleaned. 
 
 The sloop, having been 
 loaded with from two hun- 
 dred to eight hundred bush- 
 els of oysters, is run into the 
 mouth of some river or^ creek, where the water is 
 partly fresh, to "give the oysters a drink," as the fish- 
 ermen say. Here the load is thrown overboard in 
 shallow water, when the bivalves open, the water runs 
 in, and they get their "drink." In this way, it is 
 claimed, they cleanse themselves from the rubbish of 
 the sea, get rid of their salt, become white, and ap- 
 pear suddenly to fatten. The fattening, however, is 
 only a temporary puffing up with water. 
 
 When finally raised from their temporary resting 
 place, they are disposed of in different ways. Many 
 families near at hand purchase each from ten to twenty 
 
 Star -fish. 
 
OYSTER-CATCHING. 47 
 
 bushels, which are packed away with sea-weed in the 
 cellar for winter use. Those that remain till spring 
 are quite likely to be alive and well. Large quantities 
 of oysters in the shell are shipped to Europe. 
 
 For use in the interior of the country, the shells are 
 packed in barrels, the large valve down so as to retain 
 all the liquor of the animal. A large business is car- 
 ried on in "raw oysters," or those which are taken 
 from the shells and canned. The opening of oysters 
 is something of a trade in itself. An expert opener 
 will take out thirty thousand oysters in a day. The 
 raw oysters are separated according to size into ' ' me- 
 diums, " "standards, " and "selects," and are packed 
 in tin quart cans, or in gallon kegs. 
 
 The New York oysters bear many fancy names. 
 "Saddle-rocks" came originally from a reef of that 
 name on the north shore of Long Island. Twenty- 
 five of them have been known to fill a bushel. The 
 bed, however, was exhausted more than forty years 
 ago, and now any good, large oyster may be called a 
 "saddle-rock." "Blue Points," which are small but 
 of fine flavor, and sought for eating on the half-shell, 
 are from shallow bays along the southern shore of 
 Long Island. " Shrewsburys " grow at the mouth of 
 a river of that name near Sandy Hook. 
 
 The oysters of the Pacific coast are exceedingly 
 small, and are served in restaurants by the hundred 
 or half hundred. A Californian visiting New York 
 stepped into an eating-house and ordered a hundred 
 fried oysters. He was surprised when he saw spread 
 before him a full hundred Shrewsburys, a dozen of 
 which make a hearty meal. 
 
48 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 10. PEARLS AND PEARL-MAKERS. 
 
 IN the law book of the ancient Hebrews, which is 
 called the Talmud, is found a story which illustrates 
 the value of the pearl. 
 
 When Abraham came near to Egypt, he locked 
 Sarah his wife in a chest, that none might behold her 
 beauty. But when he came to the place of paying cus- 
 toms, the officer said to him, "Pay custom." And he 
 said, "I will pay the 'custom. " They said to him, "Thou 
 carriest clothes ; " and he said, "I will pay for clothes." 
 Then they said, "Thou carriest gold; " and he replied, 
 " I will pay for gold." 
 
 On this they cried, "Surely thou bearest fine silk; " 
 and he answered, "I will pay custom for the finest 
 silk." Then they said, "Surely it must be pearls that 
 thou takest with thee ; " and he only answered, " I will 
 pay for pearls." As they knew nothing more valuable 
 than pearls, they demanded that the box should be 
 opened, in order that they might determine what con- 
 cealed treasure it was for which the owner was willing 
 to pay custom sufficient for fine pearls. 
 
 And the box was opened, when they found that 
 nothing in the opinion of Abraham was too costly or 
 pure to be compared with his wife Sarah. 
 
 It is a singular Tact that pearls, regarded by some as 
 more beautiful than diamonds, are made by certain kinds 
 of clams and oysters. These are called pearl mussels and 
 pearl oysters. The lining of these shells, called nacre 
 (naker) or mother-of-pearl, is itself beautiful. The 
 mantle of the mollusk makes the shell. The fringe of 
 
PEARLS AND PEARL-MAKERS. 
 
 49 
 
 the mantle produces the outside, and from the body of 
 the mantle grows the rainbow lining. This wonderful 
 mantle, also, makes the pearl. 
 
 For a long time it was supposed that the pearl mus- 
 sel and pearl oyster mold their gems about grains of 
 sand, or produce them when diseased. It is now the 
 opinion that some little animal gets into the mussel 
 
 Pearl Oysters. 
 
 or oyster and irritates the mantle. There is then let 
 out of the mantle a small sphere or drop of nacre 
 which increases layer by layer, until it reaches the size, 
 it may be, of a large bean. Both the pearl oyster of 
 the ocean and certain species of the fresh-water mussel 
 occasionally make pearls. 
 
 One reason for the invasion of Britain by the Ro- 
 mans was said to be the attraction of its pearl fisher- 
 ies. In Irish and Scotch rivers large numbers of mus- 
 sels have been found containing pearls. In the year 
 
 1865 these rivers yielded sixty thousand dollars' worth. 
 L. c.- 4 . 
 
5O LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The Queen paid two hundred dollars for a Scotch 
 pearl. It is also said that one of the pearls that adorn 
 the royal crown of Great Britain was found by the 
 waiting lady of Catharine, the wife of Henry VIII. 
 She was fishing, and either hooked up or picked up 
 the mussel which bore the gem. 
 
 In 1857, great excitement was created by the discov- 
 ery of a very large pearl in Notch Brook near Pater- 
 son, New Jersey. A shoemaker named Howell was 
 the fortunate finder, but he had ruined the jewel by 
 cooking the mussel that contained it. A carpenter of 
 the name of Quackenbush, heard of this good fortune 
 and took to pearl-hunting. After wading about for 
 several days, he picked up a mussel containing a pearl 
 five eighths of an inch in diameter, for which a jeweler 
 in New York paid a thousand dollars. It was after- 
 ward sold in Paris for five thousand dollars. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 ROSY and green pearls, and those of a fine luster, 
 are preferred. Pearls are classed as clear, half-clear, 
 and sand-pearls. In China, mussels are kept in acqua- 
 riums and are made to manufacture pearl ornaments. 
 The natives make of tin foil little, flat, stamped images 
 for idols. These they insert within the valves of a liv- 
 ing mussel, where they remain for two or three months. 
 At the end of this period the images, still retaining 
 their original features, are covered with a coating of 
 pearl, and are then worn as pendants. 
 
 The most valuable of the gems we are describing are 
 taken from the pearl oyster, which lives in certain fa- 
 
PEARLS AND PEARL-MAKERS. 51 
 
 vored places in the sea. The finest pearls are found 
 near the islands of the Persian Gulf. Here the ancient 
 Macedonians gathered many jewels. The largest fish- 
 eries are carried on at the island of Ceylon. The fish- 
 ing grounds are in control of the British government. 
 The best pearls are yielded by oysters four years old. 
 It is said that an oyster containing a gem will die at 
 seven, and the pearl, of course, will be lost. 
 
 The fishing season occurs early in the spring, and lasts 
 about six weeks. During this time the shore of the is- 
 land is whitened with the tents of native pearl-fishers. 
 A group of boats, each containing ten men, reaches the 
 oyster banks at sunrise. At the firing of a signal gun, 
 the diving commences. The divers work in pairs. One 
 remains in the boat holding a rope. This rope is fast- 
 ened to the other, who dives ; and to him, also, a sink- 
 stone, weighing forty pounds, is attached. 
 
 The greatest danger to which the diver is exposed, is 
 the shark, which has a passion for divers' flesh. To 
 fight this monster, the man takes down with him spikes 
 made of iron-wood. Before he is let down, his clothes 
 are stripped from him by a sort of priest or shark- 
 charmer, who performs over him some strange service. 
 Should the shark, however, come to attack him, the 
 diver does not depend upon the incantations of the 
 charmer, but fights with his spikes 'and stirs up the mud 
 to blind the shark. 
 
 When the gun fires again at noon, the fleet returns, 
 and the oysters are divided into four heaps, of which 
 one goes to the fishermen for their wages, and the re- 
 maining three are sold at auction. The shells are 
 opened and the pearls are sorted by sifting them through 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Drilling Pearls. 
 
 Pearl Oyster Fishing 1 . 
 
 baskets having different sized 
 holes. Some of them are drilled 
 with holes for beads. The most 
 common size of fine oriental 
 pearls is from one and a half to 
 three times that of a pea. 
 
 The pearl which is nearest 
 perfect is round or pear-shaped. 
 It is free from speck or flaw, of delicate texture and 
 clear, almost transparent white color, with a soft gloss 
 and irridescence. The Shah or King of Persia, in 1633, 
 paid for a single pearl sixty-five thousand dollars. This 
 jewel had belonged to a Sultan who purchased it with 
 three hundred pure-blood Arab horses. 
 
 The most beautiful pearl now known is kept in a 
 museum at Moscow. It was taken more than fifty 
 years ago and weighs ninety grains. The largest pearl 
 in existence belongs to Mr. Beresford Hope, of Lon- 
 don. This magnificent gem weighs three ounces, is 
 four and a half inches in circumference, and is valued 
 at sixty thousand dollars. 
 
THE SNAIL. 53 
 
 II. THE SNAIL. 
 
 THE school-boy of three centuries ago must have 
 been a very slow creeper, or else his school was en- 
 tirely unattractive. Shakespeare, in describing the 
 seven ages, says: 
 
 "Then the whining school-boy, with his satchel 
 And shining morning face, creeping like snail 
 Unwillingly to school." 
 
 Probably there are no such boys in these days. But 
 we have snails, and by studying them we may know 
 at least one characteristic of the boy of three hundred 
 years ago. 
 
 The snail deserves more notice than it has been 
 accustomed to receive. It is far more intelligent than 
 any animal before spoken of. It has been tamed, and 
 trained to come out of its shell, when called. In Europe 
 it is regarded as a nice article of food. In this country 
 it has never been used very much for the table, al- 
 though, in this respect, it is rapidly gaining friends. 
 
 The snail is like the clam and the oyster, in two gen- 
 eral features. It has a soft body without a bone, and 
 it has a hard shell to cover the body. It is a mollusk 
 because it is soft; but it is not a bivalve, because its 
 shell does not divide into two valves. It has but one 
 shell, and is, therefore, a univalve. This shell, or one 
 nearly like it, must be looked at a moment, and its 
 different parts learned. 
 
 The figure is that of an Illinois pond snail. It is 
 turned, coiled, or whirled into a spire like the point 
 of a gimlet. Its general form is that of a cone. The 
 
54 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 cone is composed of whirls or whorls. The largest of 
 these is the body whorl (bw). Those above the body 
 are simply whorls which together form the spire (sp). 
 The opening at the base (;;/) is the mouth, the edges 
 
 of which roll back on either 
 side. The name for each of 
 these edges of -the mouth is lip. 
 The lip on the right side of 
 the mouth in some of the 
 snail's large relations a very 
 broad lip is known by its sim- 
 ple name. That on the left 
 side is designated as the colu- 
 mella lip. Carefully break in, 
 on one side, the body whorl of 
 a common snail, and you will 
 see a little column rising from 
 the inside of this lip to the 
 apex like the column ' of a 
 spiral staircase. This little col- 
 umn is the columella, and its 
 outward fold is the columella 
 - lip. The lips of the snail's 
 shell are short and roll out 
 scarcely at all. The shell itself 
 shows that it has grown by constant additions, or sec- 
 tions, which have left their lines on the outside. 
 
 Nothing could be more perfectly contrived for its 
 uses than this shell. When the animal retires within 
 it, the body must slip very easily up the spiral way 
 toward the apex. And when it is out and slowly 
 moving, what could be more compact and easily bal- 
 
 Fiff. 8. Pond Snail Shell. 
 
49 THE SNAIL. 55 
 
 anced on the snail's back than this cone with nearly 
 all its weight at the base! If the shell breaks, the 
 animal throws a sticky fluid across the fracture, and 
 soon a horny patch has grown as good as new. 
 
 The snail is more complete in its formation than the 
 oyster. The oyster has no foot. The snail has a 
 foot running along on the under side of its body. The 
 oyster has 90 head. The snail has a head. The or- 
 gans of the oyster are scattered about the mouth near 
 the hinge, the feelers, 
 ears, and eyes on the J *! 
 
 edge of the mantle. 
 
 The snail's senses are 
 gathered in its head. 
 The mouth, eyes, feel- 
 ers, and smelling or- 
 gans are there. The 
 snail has a real mouth 
 with hard jaws ; and a 
 long tongue like a rib- Pond SnalL 
 
 bon, covered with teeth which work against the upper 
 jaw and crunch the weeds it feeds upon. The oyster 
 is water-breathing, the snail is air-breathing. It has a 
 little sac which answers for lungs ; and the pond snail, 
 working on the water bottom, comes to the top occa- 
 sionally, sets free the bubble of air it has used, takes 
 a fresh bubble, and returns to its work in the water. 
 
 The snail has been slandered because it is slow. It 
 is fast enough ; faster than the oyster, which never 
 moves from its seat. And then it goes as swiftly as 
 it can, so that no one can charge it with being lazy. 
 When, too, it is considered that this creeper has but 
 
56 LIVING CREATURES. p 
 
 one foot, and that, when it moves, it must carry its 
 house on its back, it must be pronounced a hero. 
 
 Snails have a period of remaining torpid, when they 
 draw themselves within their shells, covering the mouth 
 with a sticky liquid which hardens by exposure. Thus 
 
 they remain, in temper- 
 ate climates during the 
 winter, aijd in torrid 
 climates during the 
 
 very hottest weather, 
 
 ^'l ,/' Some of the snail's 
 larger relations close 
 Land snaii,- the mouth of the shell 
 
 with a cover attached 
 to the foot. The cover fits close into the mouth. 
 
 The shell of the pond snail, with its spire raised con- 
 siderably above the body whorl, is easily distinguished 
 from that of the land snail, whose spire is very short, 
 and whose body whorl is very large. The mollusks 
 themselves differ in some respects. The pond snail 
 has two feelers or horns, the land snail has four, two 
 above and two below. The eyes of the pond snail are 
 at the base of its feelers, while the eyes of the other 
 are at the end of its upper feelers or horns. 
 
 Snails can live long without food. In 1846, a famous 
 specimen was brought from Egypt and placed in the 
 British Museum. It was supposed to be dead, but 
 revived after it had lain four years without eating. 
 There were reasons to believe that it was alive ; warm 
 water was applied and it appeared. Another one in 
 this country, from Lower California, lived in confine- 
 ment and fasted for six years. 
 
THE SNAIL S GAY RELATIONS. 
 
 12. THE SNAILS GAY RELATIONS. 
 
 I HAVE seen 
 
 A curious child who dwelt upon a tract 
 Of inland ground, applying to his ear 
 The convolutions of a smooth-lipped shell ; 
 To which, in silence hushed, his very soul 
 Listened intensely ; for from within were heard 
 Murmurings, whereby the monitor expressed 
 Mysterious union with its native sea. 
 
 Wordsworth. 
 
 VERY likely the child whom Wordsworth saw had in 
 his hand one of those shells which are called porcelain 
 shells, or cowries. I remember well the first time I 
 placed one to my ear. I really thought, as the shell 
 had come from the ocean, it had brought with it a little 
 of the ocean roar confined in its convolutions or whorls. 
 It destroys this little bubble of romance, to find that 
 the hand bent into a cup and held to the ear produces 
 nearly the same effect. 
 
 The cowry animal is essentially like the snail. The 
 cowry shell is quite different from the snail shell in 
 shape and appearance. It is almost precisely like a 
 coffee berry. It is without the spire of the cone, and 
 has only the body whorl, with an opening running its 
 whole length, thus forming its mouth. Like most of the 
 ornamental shell animals, the cowry has more of a foot 
 than its sober little cousin the snail has ; and attached 
 to this foot is a trap-door which closes the mouth of 
 the shell, when the mollusk retires into it. 
 
 Exquisitely beautiful are these cowries, covered with 
 dark spots, and equal in finish to the finest porcelain. 
 
58 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The wonder is that the shell is produced from the 
 mantle of the mollusk; and the spots, or eyes, are 
 painted by a coloring matter secreted by the mantle 
 precisely where the spots occur on the shell. Cowries 
 are of different sizes and shades. The mollusk is quite 
 as beautiful as its shell. 
 
 You can not wonder that uncivilized peoples have a 
 passion for ornamental shells. A small cowry found in 
 the Pacific Ocean is used by African tribes for money. 
 Great numbers of money cowries are shipped by En- 
 gland to Africa, where they are sold to the natives in 
 exchange for their products. These shells are the 
 common money of the natives of Bengal, Siam, and 
 Hindostan. 
 
 The first settlers of this country found the Indians 
 using shells for money. These natives cut the white 
 and the black shells in pieces, and strung them on a 
 cord or belt, which was then called wampum. The 
 squaws tied shells to the shoes they wore when danc- 
 ing, to produce a rattling, tinkling sound. The only 
 piano the Indians had consisted of strings of shells 
 hung loosely around their lodges, and played upon by 
 the fingers of the wind. The ancient Athenians made 
 use of shells for ballots, upon which they inscribed 
 their votes. In the Friendly Islands the orange cowry 
 is worn only by persons of the highest rank. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 WHO has not seen the large, reddish conch shell? 
 Formerly the farmers on the coast used this southern 
 shell for a horn to call their workmen to dinner. The 
 
THE SNAIL'S GAY RELATIONS. 
 
 59 
 
 Smooth-lipped Shell. 
 
 trumpet shell is another noisy one, with a long spire. 
 Found in West India and Panama waters, the sailors 
 call it an augur shell. This shell is supposed to have 
 
60 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 first suggested to uncivilized man the idea of the instru- 
 ment called the trumpet. The spiny murex is the 
 military horn of certain African tribes. 
 
 In ancient Palestine bee-keepers employed the conch 
 to make a whistling or hissing noise to entice their 
 bees. Says Isaiah: "And it shall come to pass that 
 the Lord shall hiss for the fly that is in the uttermost 
 parts of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in 
 
 Cassis. Group of Voluta. 
 
 Money Cowries. Shells. Conch Shells. 
 
 the land of Assyria." With the trumpet shell the 
 Italian herdsman calls his cattle, and the Welsh farmer 
 wakes the silence of his mountain wilds. 
 
 Among the collections is seen a rough, though very 
 attractive shell, covered with spines or horns. This is 
 the murex. The mollusk to which it belongs is fero- 
 cious, and attacks other mollusks. The shell is that 
 which was used by the ancient Syrians and Greeks in 
 the preparation of the Tyrian purple. The story is 
 that the purple coloring matter contained in the shell 
 
THE SNAIL'S GAY RELATIONS. 61 
 
 was first brought to notice by a dog, who broke a shell 
 with his teeth, leaving the stain on his lips. With 
 this purple the Babylonians dyed the robes they 
 dressed their idols with ; and with it Moses tinted the 
 furniture of the tabernacle. Wool dyed with Tyrian 
 purple sold, during the reign of the Emperor Au- 
 gustus, for one hundred and eighty dollars a pound. 
 
 From the cassis shell some of the cheaper cameos 
 employed in jewelry are cut. The delicate fineness and 
 blush of the cameo stone make it valuable, but the cost 
 is mainly in the cutting. 
 
 On account of their scarcity, and of the beautiful 
 coverings worn by the snail's kin, they have sometimes 
 commanded large prices. As late as 1865, rare cowries 
 sold for two hundred dollars each. Cones, valued for 
 fine polish and rich markings, brought from sixty to 
 two hundred dollars. In 1876, the gay voluta, spotted 
 with orange and white, sold for fifty dollars; before 
 that date it had cost two hundred dollars. 
 
 Of what possible use to these tender inhabitants are 
 the rich and gay colorings and luster of the whorls, or 
 the delicate tints of the lips? These gorgeous clothes 
 are, in their natural state, inclosed in a rough outside 
 crust, which is no more handsome than the shuck of a 
 cocoa-nut. Perhaps these beauties of shell grow to 
 please human eyes. Perhaps they are designed to 
 teach that what is good and beautiful in character lies 
 beneath the surface. As Wordsworth again says : 
 
 True beauty dwells in deep retreats, 
 
 Whose veil is unremoved 
 Till heart with heart in concord beats, 
 
 And the lover is beloved. 
 
62 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 13. LIVING PINCHERS. 
 
 IN most parts of the country, boys need no intro- 
 duction to crawfish ; and in the large city, or near the 
 sea-coast, any one may at times see lobsters at the 
 fish-market. Crawfish and lobsters are almost pre- 
 cisely alike. Indeed, the crawfish is sometimes called 
 the fresh-water lobster. It is about five inches long, 
 and swims near the bottom of rivers and ponds. The 
 lobster is about ten inches long, and moves about in 
 the shallow waters of the sea-coast. 
 
 To shake hands with either of these queer-looking 
 creatures is not the most pleasant way of forming their 
 acquaintance. Many a stranger has thought their 
 grasp quite too affectionate. In fact, their grip is a 
 pinch, and their hands, such as they have, are pinch- 
 ers, and are armed with ugly teeth. Boys who have 
 once been pinched have learned to pick them up by 
 the back, so as to handle them without injury. It 
 would be well to hold one in this way long enough to 
 see how it is fitted for the battle of life to get its 
 food, and to fight its enemies. 
 
 The lobster and the crawfish have no true bones in 
 their bodies. The body is divided into three main 
 parts, called the head, the thorax or breastplate, and 
 the abdomen. This last part is again made up of seven 
 pieces or joints. The whole body is covered by a hard 
 outside crust. The animals are, therefore, called crus- 
 taceans. The crust or shell is of a black or dark green 
 color when the animal is alive. Those lobsters that 
 lie quietly in the fish-market, are -dead, and have been 
 
LIVING PINCHERS. 63 
 
 partly cooked. Cooking, you will observe, turns the 
 color of the shell red. 
 
 This creature seems to have legs in abundance. It 
 is a great improvement upon the snail that has no legs. 
 Attached to the thorax are eight pairs of limbs, the 
 first three pairs being used as jaws, and called foot-jaws; 
 the next pair are the great claws ; and the four pairs 
 behind the claws are the walking legs. Six pairs of 
 
 American Lobster. 
 
 smaller limbs are fastened to six of the joints of the 
 abdomen, and are used as paddles for swimming. They 
 are called swimmerets. 
 
 The last joint of the abdomen, or the tail-fin, works 
 back and forth, and helps the animal to swim back- 
 wards, when it so desires. The two great claws are not 
 precisely alike. The more clumsy one has coarse teeth, 
 and is used to anchor the animal or hold it firmly to 
 some object, while the other has fine teeth and is used 
 
64 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 for seizing and crushing the prey. Protected by its 
 hard shell, and armed with these huge pinchers, the 
 lobster ought to fight pretty well. And so it does. 
 Indeed, it is so quarrelsome and ferocious that the fish- 
 erman is obliged to fasten the claws with pieces of 
 wood, even while the animal is waiting to be boiled. 
 
 The crustaceans have a definite head, which is well 
 provided with eyes, ears, mouth and other organs. 
 From the sides of the head reach out two long whip- 
 like things, which are feelers, with which the animals 
 lash the water and touch the objects they meet. On 
 the top of the head is a pair of smaller feelers, at the 
 base of which are the ears. 
 
 We hunted about the mantle of the oyster for eyes. 
 See what eyes the crustaceans have, standing out on 
 knobs or stocks. Unfortunately they are very obscure 
 in the picture. Besides being so prominent, they are 
 not common single eyes, but each stock has many sin- 
 gle eyes packed together. Well fitted, then, the lob- 
 ster and crawfish seem to be for moving on the muddy 
 bottom, for catching and eating the dead fish and other 
 animal matter upon which they live, and for fighting 
 away their enemies. 
 
 Of course the crustaceans are water-breathing ani- 
 mals, and have gills in which the blood and the air of 
 the water meet. These gills are found at the places 
 where the legs join the body. The young are hatched 
 from eggs. To make room for their growth, the shell 
 or crust is shed, or molted, as many as six times dur- 
 ing the first year, a larger crust coming with each 
 change. 
 
 In the spring the crustaceans lay their eggs, which 
 
CRABS. 65 
 
 adhere to their swimmerets. A single lobster lays 
 about twenty thousand eggs. After the young are 
 hatched, they cling to the swimming legs of their 
 mothers until they are about a third of an inch long, 
 when, with bright blue eyes and a pair of small feet 
 for swimming, they dodge about in the water at a 
 lively rate. At this period of their existence they are 
 dainty food for large fishes. At three months of age 
 they acquire all the parts of the grown animal, and 
 then settle down on the bottom like the old people, 
 to catch and to be caught. 
 
 14. CRABS. 
 
 TAKE away the rear part or abdomen of the lobster 
 and you have the crab. There are some different ar- 
 rangements about the mouth, and the crab swims in 
 the water instead of gliding near the bottom, as its 
 near relation, the lobster, does. The soft-shell crabs 
 of the sea are considered delicate eating, but every one 
 does not know how to account for the name they bear. 
 
 The soft-shell crab has a hard crust for a covering, 
 as its near friends have. But from time to time it 
 sheds its shell. When the old shell has been thrown 
 off, it is some days before the new shell becomes hard. 
 During this period the crab is very tender, ancl is de- 
 licious food; and on this account it receives its name 
 soft-shell. It is, however, a common crab. 
 
 The whole family of lobsters and crabs is composed 
 L. c. ?. 
 
66 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 of ludicrous members, but the drollest of all is the 
 hermit crab. It is really more of a lobster than a 
 crab, for it has quite a long abdomen, while the crab 
 has scarcely any. This hermit wears a good shell on 
 the main part of his body ; but unfortunately the 
 hinder part is naked and tender, and is exposed to 
 attack. 
 
 Now he will surely die if he can not inclose his del- 
 icate part in the shell of some mollusk. To find such 
 
 Common Edible Crab. 
 
 a covering it is necessary for him to be a thief and 
 a robber. Having found a convenient shell of sufficient 
 size, and having dragged the innocent occupant out, 
 the hermit pokes in his tail-part and hooks it fast to 
 the inside of the shell by two small feet, which grow 
 out from the end of .the tail, seemingly for this very 
 purpose. 
 
 When the lobster grows too big for his shell he 
 
LEEUWENHOEK. 
 
 6 7 
 
 sheds it, and gets a new one. But the hermit crab 
 occupies the dead shell of another ; what shall he do 
 v/hen he outgrows his shelter^ As he is often kept 
 in an aquarium his pranks 
 have been carefully watched. 
 He hunts' about until he 
 finds some mollusk like a 
 snail, inclosed in its house. 
 He turns the shell over and 
 over, as if calculating on its 
 size. He pokes a foot with- 
 in to see who is there. If 
 he concludes that the house Hermit Cmb - 
 
 is good enough and large enough for him, he jerks 
 out its tenant and himself jumps in all in a moment. 
 
 15. LEEUWENHOEK. 
 
 THE old town of Delfth in Holland is associated 
 with a familiar event in American history. It was 
 from the harbor of this town from Delfth Haven 
 that the Pilgrim Fathers, in 1620, embarked on the 
 Speedwell and the Mayflower to sail to America. 
 Another event adds a new interest to Delfth. 
 
 It was here that, in 1632, a boy was born who be- 
 came one of the great discoverers that used the mi- 
 croscope. His name was Anthony van Leeuwenhoek 
 (pronounced Luh'wenhook). As his surname does 
 not slip easily from an American tongue, he may be 
 
68 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 called simply Anthony. The education of Anthony 
 was very imperfect. He never graduated from college, 
 but he seems to have made the most of his limited 
 opportunities. 
 
 Only a few years before the Mayflower landed its 
 shivering passengers on Plymouth Rock, and the Half 
 Moon anchored at the mouth of the Hudson, the tel- 
 escope and the microscope were invented. The prin- 
 cipal part of both these instruments is the glass lens. 
 To prepare lenses, and get their shape exactly right, 
 was at that time a great labor. The lenses must be 
 slowly ground and polished. This art was sometimes 
 learned by bright boys, of whom Anthony was one. 
 And he became a lens-grinder. 
 
 Those who use the microscope at the present day, 
 find in it a most delightful and fascinating employ- 
 ment. With it they examine things other people have 
 seen and told about, and find, in going over these dis- 
 coveries, great arnusement. How much more enjoy- 
 ment, then, must those have had who, with the mi- 
 croscope, for the first time, discovered these things. 
 
 The opening of the great world of little things 
 created great excitement. Everybody who could buy 
 one, purchased a microscope. The grinding of lenses 
 was a lively business. To this work Anthony devoted 
 both his energies and his wits. Soon he found out 
 how to make much better lenses than any other could 
 construct, insomuch that he was regarded as one of 
 the inventors of the microscope. 
 
 Anthony did more than work at his lenses. He 
 himself used the improved lens, in searching out the 
 new and wonderful things in nature. And what did 
 
LEEUWENHOEK. 69 
 
 he find that was new? "The House I Live In" gives 
 an account of the voyage which a drop of blood makes 
 when it leaves the heart, passes through J;he arteries 
 to the muscles and bones, and returns to the heart 
 through the veins. 
 
 The credit of discovering this trip of the drop of 
 blood is due to an English physician, William Harvey, 
 who died when Anthony was twenty-five years old. 
 
 But there was one part of the journey of the blood 
 which Dr. Harvey did not explain. 
 When the red traveler reaches its 
 destination, how does it leave the 
 artery, get through the muscles, 
 and jump into the veins ? 
 
 This question Anthony answered 
 by the use of his microscope. He 
 found the minute capillary (or 
 hair) tubes which convey the blood 
 from the arteries to every part of 
 the muscles and bones, and throw 
 it into the veins, so that it may 
 go back to the heart and lungs. 
 About the time of this discovery, 
 
 Improved Microscope. 
 
 Anthony received a visit from 
 Peter the Great of Russia, who was delighted to see, 
 through the microscope, the circulation of the blood in 
 the tail of an eel. 
 
 He discovered that the human hair is solid and not 
 a tube ; that cochineal, which produces red and purple 
 dyes, is an insect and not a seed as people supposed ; 
 that the grubs, or maggots, which appear upon spoiled 
 meat are hatched from eggs, and are not sponta- 
 
/O LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 neously born from decaying substance. He proved 
 that every living thing comes from a living parent of 
 the same kind. He found the compound eyes of some 
 insects ; the beautiful scales on the wings of butterflies : 
 the spinners and poison claws of the spider. 
 
 In the gutters of the house roof, there is nearly 
 always collected more or less moss or dirt mixed with 
 leaves. Of course, during the absence of rain, this 
 litter becomes very dry. Now if a pinch of this dust 
 be moistened in water, and placed under a microscope, 
 pretty soon little animals, no larger than the head of 
 a pin, appear swimming and dancing about, as antic 
 as pollywogs. They are called rotifers or wheel-bear- 
 ers, because they have, at the place where the mouth 
 should be expected, a wheel fringed with lively hairs 
 with which they draw in their invisible prey. Entirely 
 dry, like grains of sand, they may exist for a long 
 time, and wake into activity when wet. 
 
 These wheel-bearers were first brought to light by 
 Anthony van Leeuwenhoek. Many other things, also, 
 did he discover with his microscope, and many things 
 about such things as had already been discovered. 
 
 1 6. SPIDERS. 
 
 ONE is struck with a certain resemblance between 
 crab and spider. The latter has eight walking legs, of 
 which the first pair from the head are used for feelers. 
 They are jointed like the legs of crab and lobster, and 
 
SPIDERS. /I 
 
 it is said that the leg of the spider will grow out again, 
 should one or two joints be lost. The spider is com- 
 monly regarded as an insect. But it is without some 
 very important characteristics which belong to insects, 
 as will be seen in the chapter on the fly. 
 
 The spider's jaws are a little like the lobster's pinch- 
 ers. They are furnished with rough teeth for crunch- 
 ing flies and other food, and are armed at the end, 
 each with a sharp claw which opens and 
 shuts upon the jaw, like the blade of a 
 jack-knife. These jaws are excellent 
 tools for the butcher's work of the spi- 
 der, and are deadly weapons in the fight. 
 Through the claw runs a tube carrying 
 poisonous liquid which flows into the 
 
 . n . _,. Spider's Jaws. 
 
 wound, when a bite is inflicted. The 
 
 poison, however, affects the human being scarcely more 
 
 than the poison of the mosquito. 
 
 Eight eyes on the back of the head furnish the ani- 
 mal with abundant power of sight. As to ears, search 
 for them and you will not find them. The creature 
 hears there is no doubt about that. She loves a tink- 
 ling sound, enjoys the strains of music, sometimes let- 
 ting herself down from the ceiling to hear it. Out of 
 her snug den she will run at the buzzing of a fly, or 
 wasp or tuning fork. Perhaps the hairs on their legs 
 have the faculty of hearing; for when listening to 
 sounds, these hairs are raised, just as some animals 
 erect their ears. 
 
 The spider breathes by tubes running through differ- 
 ent parts of its body, and by small air sacs from 
 two to four which may be called lungs. The method 
 
72 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 of catching its game is that which makes this animal 
 so interesting. Some kinds of spiders seize their vic- 
 tim by jumping upon it ; others by running it down, 
 as the tarantula of Italy does. But most of the varie- 
 ties make snares for their prey, by their wonderful and 
 exquisite webs. Before explaining their art of spin- 
 ning and weaving, read a short fairy story of the an- 
 cient Greeks. 
 
 Garden Spider. 
 
 Athena (A the'na) who is sometimes called Minerva, 
 was the daughter of Jupiter, and was the goddess of 
 agriculture. The ancients thought she invented the 
 plow and the rake ; and taught how to yoke oxen 
 and to take care of horses. She has the credit of 
 many other inventions. It was she, they said, who in- 
 vented every kind of work that women performed. 
 She taught the fingers how to spin, to sew, and to 
 weave ; and how to work the beautiful embroidery and 
 tapestry in which the Grecian women excelled. 
 
SPIDERS. 73 
 
 Arachne (A rack'ne) was a maiden who lived in 
 Lydia. Her father Idmon was a famous dyer in pur- 
 ple, and she was a skilled weaver. She grew bold 
 enough to challenge Athena to a contest in her art; 
 and for her part produced an exquisite piece of tapes- 
 try. Athena, because she could find no fault in her 
 competitor's work, grew proud and jealous, and tore 
 the cloth in pieces. Whereupon Arachne, over- 
 whelmed with despair, hanged herself. But the god- 
 dess softened a little and loosened the rope, saving the 
 life of Arachne. The rope was then instantly changed 
 into a cobweb, and Arachne was transformed into a 
 spider, the animal which above all others Athena hated. 
 
 This story, or fable, is the method the ancients em- 
 ployed of teaching that man learned the art of weav- 
 ing from the spider, and that the art was invented in 
 Lydia. It is a pleasant way of telling something which 
 is probably quite true. In a great many of the arts 
 men have taken their first lessons from animals. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 PASSING by the house spider and the cellar spider, 
 whose webs are woven in a great variety of shapes, 
 the garden, or geometric, spider gives the most interest- 
 ing example of spinning and weaving. You may have 
 seen her trudging along the ground, lugging a white 
 silken sack which she is reluctant to part with. Per- 
 haps you were not aware that this bundle contained 
 her eggs. Had you watched closely you might have 
 seen the young, after the eggs were hatched, riding 
 on the back of their mother. 
 
74 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 In spinning, the hind foot holds and guides the 
 thread. The foot of Epeira, as the garden spider is 
 called, should be examined and understood. Each foot 
 has three claws, the middle one of which is bent over 
 for clinging to the web. The other 
 two have teeth like a comb, and in- 
 deed are used, in part, for cleansing 
 the limbs and webs. Over against 
 the claws are stiff hairs which are 
 also toothed, and which shut like a 
 thumb against the claws. 
 
 The wonder of the spider is the 
 manufacture of her silk web. On the back of Epeira 
 are six points, each about the size of a pin's point. 
 These are her spinnerets. Each spinneret contains a 
 multitude of fine tubes some say a thousand from 
 each of which issues a sticky fluid made in the body 
 of the spider. This fluid hardens as soon as it feels 
 the air ; and the minute threads join to make a strong 
 cable. The six spinnerets may each make a separate 
 cable, or by bending toward one another may join all 
 into one. The spider's thread is not 
 more than a four-thousandth part of 
 an inch thick. 
 
 Epeira chooses a place for her gos- 
 samer wheel where the ends may be 
 securely fastened, and where she may spinnerets 
 
 make for herself a convenient den. 
 After throwing across the space a thread or two, she 
 carries out from the center several rays or spokes, mak- 
 ing each tight. She fastens a web to an object by sim- 
 ply touching the spinneret to the object. Having ar- 
 
SPIDERS. 75 
 
 ranged the spokes, she begins at the center and runs 
 a spiral thread round and round. 
 
 These spiral threads are smooth and dry, and are as 
 far apart as the spider can conveniently reach. They 
 are intended only for a temporary scaffolding to walk 
 upon. Now Epeira begins at the outside or circum- 
 ference of the wheel and works toward the center, 
 carrying round and round a new thread which is wet 
 and sticky, all the while biting away the scaffold be- 
 fore her. Thus she leaves the sticky thread behind 
 her, while she has the smooth, dry one to walk on. 
 
 After all is finished, Madam Epeira builds a silken 
 den for herself to hide in, in some place near by, 
 where she may be secure and at the same time watch 
 her work. A single telephone thread joins the woven 
 net to her den, and upon this line she holds her sen- 
 sitive foot. Should a fly strike any part of the net, 
 she instantly feels the touch, hastens to the spot, and 
 makes the intruder a prisoner, by spinning about its 
 legs and wings a strong rope of silk. Though beauti- 
 ful, it is a certain death-trap for the fly ; and though 
 so elaborate and perfect, it may be constructed in 
 three quarters of an hour. 
 
 All the wonderful work done by the spider is per- 
 formed by the female. The male of some kinds is 
 exceedingly small in comparison ; so much so, that as 
 a certain naturalist calculates, were he a man six feet 
 high and weighing a hundred and fifty pounds, she, 
 supposing her to be a woman, would measure seventy- 
 five feet high and weigh two hundred thousand pounds. 
 Her treatment of her poor, insignificant mate is set 
 forth in the following little poem. 
 
76 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 1 7. MISS SPIDER S WEDDING BREAKFAST. 
 
 A FAT little spider married would be, 
 So he made him a rope and climbed a tree 
 To where Miss Spider was making a pie 
 Of a bumble bee and a small house fly. 
 
 And she wed him there in the morning light, 
 When the dew on the grass was round and bright, 
 Then spread out her table so lacy and fine, 
 And off from her husband began to dine. 
 
 She ate him all, from his head to his heel, 
 And never a pang of remorse did feel, 
 But, as curled up close in her cosy bed, 
 "That spider was tough," to herself she said. 
 
 1 8. AMONG THE INSECTS. 
 
 ON the copy from which this page is printed a fly 
 lighted. Did he think I was writing about him? And 
 had he come to see that I did not slander him? He 
 stands still, and does not mind a motion of the hand, 
 as flies usually do. He has found something to eat 
 that explains it all. Thank you, Musca, for I believe 
 that is the name they have given you. I want to 
 look you over a little. 
 
 A spot of mucilage on the paper seems to attract 
 him. Keep still ! There is a magnifying glass at hand 
 
AMONG THE INSECTS. 
 
 77 
 
 Fly Magnified. 
 
 which I will hold over him. He lets down his bill, 
 or trunk. Even with the naked eye, I have often seen 
 flies do that ; but I see more accurately with the glass. 
 The mucilage is hard, but he will penetrate it, for he 
 is dropping moisture upon it from his tongue. 
 
 Soon I have looked him nearly all over ; have seen 
 
78 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 his bill unfold, and the knob on the end of it divide 
 and spread out flat ; have seen his feelers reaching 
 forward from his head, his two round eyes, his two 
 wings, and six legs. 
 
 Now Musca is through with the mucilage, and be- 
 gins a droll performance. The fore legs are rubbed 
 together, in the most lively manner, to clean away the 
 gum and dust that stick to them, I suppose. He bal- 
 ances himself on the middle pair, and rubs the hind 
 legs in the same way. Again he comes to the fore 
 legs, and I discover something that reminds me of the 
 cat. He touches his legs to his lips, which are one 
 with his tongue, and with them washes his face. 
 
 I am through with you now ; you can go, little 
 Musca. I shall not injure you. There come to my 
 mind the words of kind-hearted Uncle Toby, when he 
 opened the window to let out one of your foreign an- 
 cestors : " Get thee gone," he said ; "for why should 
 I harm thee? Is not the world big enough for both 
 thee and me?'* 
 
 Having gathered all the facts my eyes can reach, I 
 will now turn to books to ascertain whether some other 
 one has seen more than I have, and whether I have 
 seen correctly. Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 
 which contains much information besides definitions, 
 says the fly is a "winged insect." The winged feat- 
 ure is very clear, for on Musca's back I saw two gauzy 
 wings with bronze and purple tints. Turn now to 
 "insect." This is a name given to certain small ani- 
 mals whose bodies appear cut in, or almost "di- 
 vided " so the great book says. 
 
 This knowledge is helpful. The fly did appear ' 'cut 
 
AMONG THE INSECTS. 79 
 
 in" n ot in two, but in three parts. The book has 
 named the parts. They are the head, the thorax, and 
 the abdomen. These, jointed together, were seen in 
 Musca; and I further observed that the six legs and 
 the two wings were attached to the thorax, or middle 
 division. With the aid of the glass I could see the 
 short feelers, or antennae, on Musca's head. Keener 
 eyes may see them without the glass. 
 
 Much more can not be seen, except by dissecting 
 the fly and examining its parts under a microscope. 
 The fly has no hard jaws or teeth, as some insects have, 
 and can not bite. When the tongue is unfolded to 
 touch a piece of sugar, the knob on the end of it spreads 
 out into two flat leaves covered with small hair-tubes. 
 The sugar is first moistened and dissolved ; then 
 scraped and sucked up by the hairy lips. In like man- 
 ner book-covers and pictures are injured, the fly scrap- 
 ing them with the leaves of its tongue. 
 
 The eyes of the fly seem to be two, but the micro- 
 scope discovers that they are composed of a great 
 many several thousand minute eyes, each with a lit- 
 tle nerve of its own. Three small and single eyes are 
 on the back of the head, but their precise use is not 
 known. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 WHEN the fly walks, three legs are thrown forward 
 at one time two on one side and one on the other. 
 The microscope reports that the leg and the foot are 
 covered with stiff hairs, so that they are like combs or 
 brushes. This is the reason, then, why Musca rubbed 
 his legs together that one brush might clean the 
 
8o 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 other. The foot is quite as wonderful as the eye, for 
 its construction shows how the fly can walk with its 
 back downwards, and on smooth surfaces. 
 
 On the last joints of the foot are a pair of claws under 
 each of which is a pad or soft cushion. For a long time 
 it was supposed that the pads were hollow like cups, 
 and adhered to the surface by pressing out the air. 
 This has been found to be a 
 mistake. The latest discov- 
 eries, as given by Prof. C. V: 
 Riley, prove that the pads are 
 beset by ever so many knobbed 
 hairs, as shown in the drawing. 
 From each hair flows a fluid 
 which keep,s its end or disk 
 moist, and enables it to stick. 
 The smoother the surface the 
 more closely will the hairs stick. 
 On rougher surfaces, like a 
 Fiys Foot Magnified. whitewashed or papered wall, 
 the delicate claws are able to cling to the microscopic 
 unevenness, without aid from the hairs. 
 
 Where are the fly's ears? The sense of touch is 
 chiefly in the antennae which project like horns from 
 the forehead. Some other insects, as the cricket, have 
 very long antennae. The fine hairs on the legs, also, 
 have the power of feeling. But there are no ears to 
 be found. 
 
 It is equally difficult to find the fly's nose. But it is 
 evident that it can smell. Careful and continued ob- 
 servation has proved that the fly and most other insects 
 feel, hear, and smell with their antennae. A sort of 
 
AMONG THE INSECTS. 8 1 
 
 ear, it should be said, has been found on the abdomen 
 of the cockroach. 
 
 Having learned how easy it is to crush a fly or a 
 mosquito, it is well to inquire about the bones of these 
 animals. A bird or a chicken can not be so com- 
 pletely pulverized by pressing upon it. After the flesh, 
 or soft part of the chicken is removed, the bones 
 hard and tough remain. After the horny case that 
 incloses the insect is broken, the soft parts, or flesh, 
 are found within. The crust that envelops it, is the fly's 
 skeleton. The fly wears its skeleton on the outside of 
 its flesh ; the chicken wears its skeleton on the inside. 
 
 The fly digests its food much more simply than 
 does the chicken. Through 
 its body runs a single tube 
 which is enlarged in one 
 place for a gizzard armed 
 with horny teeth ; and in 
 anotner place it swells into a 
 sac for 'a stomach. No red 
 
 Fig. 9. Breathing Tubes of Ply. 
 
 blood appears to flow when 
 
 the insect is wounded or crushed. The blood of insects 
 
 is white or colorless. 
 
 Another peculiarity of the fly, and of its fellow in- 
 sects, is the way in which they breathe. They do not 
 draw the air through the mouth into lungs, as we do. 
 They have no lungs. In the crust which covers their 
 bodies are holes, or spiracles (sp\ that open into tubes. 
 These tubes, swelling into air-sacs here and there, 
 branch into every part of the body. Alongside of 
 them lie the blood-vessels which receive air from the 
 tubes, as our blood takes air from our lungs. 
 
 L. C.-6. 
 
82 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 After finding so many odd features in the fly, it .need 
 not be surprising to learn that the young fly comes to 
 be full-grown in a wonderful way. The hen lays an 
 egg from which a chicken is hatched a small, downy, 
 feeble thing which in two years becomes an adult 
 fowl. The fly lays an egg that hatches, when behold ! 
 not a little fly, but a small, white worm or grub about 
 one third of an inch long. This thing the ancients 
 called a larva, which means a mask, because a real fly 
 was supposed to be hidden within. 
 
 The fly's eggs are laid and hatched in the litter 
 which collects about the stable, or elsewhere. The 
 minute grub eats heartily for perhaps a week, and then 
 appears to die, and change into a shelly case. To this 
 little thing, quiet and motionless as a mummy, the 
 name pupa was given, which means a doll or girl. In 
 about two weeks this pupa splits open, when, not a 
 doll or a girl, but a full-grown, full-winged fly steps 
 out, dries its wings, and flies away, as if it knew all 
 about the world. 
 
 After the great army of summer flies has been de- 
 stroyed by age, by fly-traps, and cool weather, a few 
 strong ones remain stupid, sleeping like woodchucks 
 and bears, until spring. Then, about the month of 
 May, the laying commences, a single fly depositing 
 several hundred eggs. These hatch, pass through the 
 changes described, and many of them, in turn, produce 
 eggs. The easiest way to be rid of the immense swarms 
 of summer is to destroy the spring mothers, which are 
 few. In the same way it is easier to strangle a bad 
 habit than to fight down all the wrong actions that 
 spring from it. 
 
A MUSICAL BURGLAR. 83 
 
 19. A MUSICAL BURGLAR. 
 
 ISAAC T. HOPPER was a kind, humorous Quaker, who 
 lived in New York City forty years ago. He was al- 
 ways ready to give or take a joke. One day when he 
 was buying some peaches at a fruit-stand, he said to 
 the woman, "A serious accident happened at our 
 house last night. I killed two robbers." " Dear me ! " 
 she exclaimed. "Were they young men, or old con- 
 victs?" "I don't know about that," he replied. "I 
 should think they might have been by the noise they 
 made. But I despatched them before they had stolen 
 much. The walls are quite bloody." 
 
 "Has a coroner's inquest been called?" inquired 
 the woman. When he answered "No," she lifted her 
 hands in astonishment, and exclaimed: "Well now, I 
 do declare ! If anybody else had done it there would 
 have been a great fuss about it ; but you are a priv- 
 ileged man, Mr. Hopper." When he was about to 
 walk away, he said to the woman, ' ' I did not mention 
 to thee that the robbers I killed were two mosquitoes." 
 
 The insect to which the Spaniards have given the 
 pretty name of mosquito is a burglar. It enters the 
 house at night for the purpose of stealing. For a rob- 
 ber its way is a bold and honest one. It is not a 
 sneak-thief. With the sound of music it advances, for 
 it is a bugler as well as a burglar. 
 
 Why does this winged robber so loudly announce 
 her coming? Rather, one would say, let her slip 
 quietly in when the victims are asleep, take a little 
 tube full of blood and be off. 
 
8 4 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 To most people the bugle of the mosquito is as un- 
 welcome as her lancet-sting. It gives a musical sound, 
 but there are fidgety thoughts of surgery and blood 
 mingled with the music. Possibly this is the very rea- 
 son why the mosquito pipes her tune to irritate the 
 nerves of her poor victim, who 
 is trying to coax sleep. When 
 the victim is excited, the blood 
 flows more freely, and the veins 
 
 Mosquito and Imago Magnified. 
 
 are full. Very appropriate -is it, therefore, for this 
 visitor to fill a vein by her noise, before she taps it 
 with her beak. 
 
 Like the house fly, our night-warbler has the char- 
 acteristics of the true insect the head, the thorax, 
 and the abdomen ; the six legs and two wings. In 
 some respects she is different from the fly, and she is 
 
A MUSICAL BURGLAR. 
 
 far more beautiful. Her form is more graceful and 
 elegant. Her attire is as gorgeous as a queen's. Her 
 wings, as thin as a spider's web, are of soft, amber 
 color. Her breast is brilliant red ; her body dark 
 green ; her eyes glittering like diamonds ; the proboscis, 
 with which she pierces for blood, keener than the finest 
 needle-point, and bright, like polished ebony. All 
 this beauty, however, is lost in the darkness of night, 
 and in the day-time, can be seen only by the aid of 
 the microscope. 
 
 The complete mosquito lives wholly in the air, 
 though its infancy is passed in the water. The egg 
 from which it is hatched is one of several hundred 
 which, when laid, are glued together in 
 the shape of a boat, and set afloat on 
 the water. In about a week these eggs 
 are hatched, and then appears the swarm 
 of larvae, or " wigglers, " so often seen in 
 a stagnant pool, where they eat the par- 
 ticles of decaying matter that may con- 
 tain the germs of disease. When the 
 water is undisturbed, these active swim- 
 mers are found near the surface, with 
 their heads downwards. They breathe 
 the air through a hairy tube extending 
 out near the tail. Touch the top of the 
 water and they quickly wiggle to the bottom for safety. 
 
 From ten to fifteen days after these larvae the wig- 
 glers appear, they change into the pupa state. The 
 pupa sheds its skin several times, and moves or tumbles 
 around by the use of two small fins or paddles. In 
 about ten days, when the perfect mosquito is grown 
 
 Mosquito Larva. 
 
86 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 within, the pupa shell bursts open on the back and 
 forms a boat or raft. The mosquito puts out its head, 
 then one pair of legs after another, until all are out, 
 and the wings are free though wet. Now it balances 
 itself on its tail, waiting for the legs and wings to 
 grow strong and dry enough for use. This is a dan- 
 gerous moment. A gust of wind or a drop of rain 
 will cause a shipwreck. For this reason mosquitoes 
 are only brought forth in still or stagnant waters. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 WHEN the voyage of infancy is successfully passed, 
 the complete mosquitoes begin life on the wing. The 
 males, during a very short life, remain in the woods 
 and marshes. The females alone do the biting, and 
 they at once set out to find victims that have blood. 
 Whether they can see in the dark, or can scent their 
 prey afar off, it is not certain. Something enables 
 them to find human habitations, and the sleeping in- 
 mates whom they serenade. 
 
 The beak that extends out in front of the head is a 
 case of piercing instruments which our burglar brings 
 with her. They are the mouth-parts of the mosquito, 
 and are very different from the mouth-organs of the 
 house fly. When not in use, they are laid close to- 
 gether, and are sheathed by the under lip. 
 
 In Figure 10 appears the head of the mosquito 
 with its compound eyes. Curving out -from the fore- 
 head, to right and left, are the antennae, or principal 
 feelers (a). Below these is the upper lip (ul) which 
 has a groove running its full length to receive the 
 
A MUSICAL BURGLAR. 8/ 
 
 tongue (t), the two large jaws (lj} and the two small 
 jaws (sj). These jaws are not really such, but are 
 more like fangs. The upper ones, indeed, convey 
 poison into the wound, as do the fangs of the rattle- 
 snake ; and this poison dilutes the blood and makes it 
 flow to the tongue through which it is drawn into the 
 stomach. The lower jaws are 
 barbed at the end, that they may 
 work back and forth like saws. 
 
 These mouth parts are spread 
 out in the figure, to show them 
 more distinctly. When the -mos- 
 quito bites they are pressed to- Fig " ia Mouth part8 ' 
 gether in the upper lip, making a beak like an awl. 
 When our tuneful robber proposes to take blood, she 
 discourses her music in circling flights about an un- 
 easy head, until she finds a favorable spot. There she 
 lights, gracefully setting down one foot after another, 
 and at once thrusts through the skin her compound 
 awl, sheath, poison fangs, saws and tongue and 
 draws her meal of blood. 
 
 Some have supposed her song to be caused by the 
 motion of her wings, which make fifty vibrations in a 
 second. Others have thought the song to be produced 
 by the insect blowing through her breathing tubes. 
 Whatever its cause, the mosquito's tune would be a 
 charming one were it not associated with instruments 
 of torture and a blood-thirsty tongue. 
 
 There are in this country over thirty varieties of mos- 
 quitoes. Some are small and others are quite large. 
 Some live wholly on vegetable juices, while others have 
 a passion for animal fluids. The largest, and perhaps 
 
88 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 the most ferocious kind, is one which the steamboatmen 
 of the Mississippi River call the gallinipper. Of it they 
 tell strange stories. They describe it as being as large 
 as a goose ; and they gravely declare that it flies about 
 at night with a brick-bat under its wings to sharpen 
 its beak with. 
 
 2O. TO A MOSQUITO. 
 
 FAIR insect! that with thread-like legs spread out, 
 And blood-extracting bill and filmy wing, 
 
 Dost murmur, as thou slowly sail'st about, 
 In pitiless ears full many a plaintive thing, 
 
 And tell how little our large veins would bleed, 
 
 Would we but yield them to thy bitter need. 
 
 Unwillingly, I own, and, what is worse, 
 Full angrily men hearken to thy plaint; 
 
 Thou gettest many a brush, and many a curse, 
 For saying thou art gaunt, and starved, and faint; 
 
 Even the old beggar, while he asks for food, 
 
 Would kill thee, hapless stranger, if he could. 
 
 Beneath the rushes was thy cradle swung, 
 
 And when at length thy gauzy wings grew strong, 
 
 Abroad to gentle airs their folds were flung, 
 Rose in the sky and bore thee soft along ; 
 
 The south wind breathed to waft thee on the way, 
 
 And danced and shone beneath the billowy bay. 
 
THE HOUSE CRICKET. 89 
 
 21. THE HOUSE CRICKET. 
 
 TENDER insects, says White, that live abroad, either 
 enjoy only the short period of one summer, or doze 
 away the cold, uncomfortable months in profound slum- 
 bers. But the house crickets, residing, as it were, in a 
 torrid zone, are always alert and merry. A good 
 Christmas fire is to them what the heat of the dog-day 
 is to others. 
 
 Around in sympathetic mirth, 
 
 Its tricks the kitten tries; 
 The cricket chirrups in the hearth, 
 The crackling faggot flies. 
 
 As one would suppose, by their living near fires, they 
 are a thirsty race, and show a liking for liquids, being 
 frequently found drowned in pans of water, milk, broth, 
 or the like. Whatever is moist they seek for, and 
 therefore they gnaw holes in wet woolen stockings and 
 aprons that are hung near the fire. These animals are 
 not only very thirsty, but very hungry ; for they will 
 eat yeast, crumbs, and kitchen sweepings of almost 
 every description. 
 
 In summer they have been seen to fly, when it be- 
 came dusk, out of the windows and over the neigh- 
 boring roofs. This accounts for their coming to new 
 houses where they were not known before pleased 
 with the moisture of the walls, and getting into the 
 soft cracks between the bricks. 
 
 Common prejudice frequently prevents any attempt 
 being made to rid the house of this noisy animal. 
 Many persons imagine that their presence is attended 
 
90 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 with good fortune, and that to drive them away or kill 
 them will bring some misfortune on the family. 
 
 The noise of the cricket is produced by the male. 
 He elevates his horny wing-cases, and rubs them briskly 
 together. The sound, no doubt, suggested the name, 
 for it is just like the syllables, cree-cree. It is in the 
 dusk of the evening, when friendly faces are assem- 
 
 House and Field Crickets. 
 
 bled around the blazing hearth, that the warmth raises 
 the cricket's cry. It is the single tale, the one chant 
 of its life ; and however loud the conversation or the 
 laugh, its shrill note is heard through all. 
 
 This shrilling of the cricket was once so troublesome 
 to a lady as to cause her to resort to every means to 
 dislodge the insect from its roost ; but all in vain. It 
 so happened that a wedding was celebrated in her 
 
CRICKETS OF THE FIELD. 9! 
 
 house, with all kinds of music. The trumpet and the 
 drum were rather more than the cricket could cry 
 down ; and whether from fright, or from anger at being 
 conquered, it is not certain ; but certain it is that 
 crickets never again troubled the house or the lady. 
 There are few, however, who object to the cry; for 
 over the hearts of most men the merry chirp of the 
 house cricket has power, calling up those days when 
 its single note was mingled with many a voice which 
 will not, perhaps, be heard again. 
 
 The learned Scaliger, who lived in Italy more than 
 three hundred years ago, kept some crickets in a box 
 to cheer him in his labors. This practice also prevails 
 in Spain ; and in Africa persons make a trade of crick- 
 ets. They feed them in a kind of iron oven, and sell 
 them to the natives, among whom the noise they make 
 is thought to be pleasing; and these people believe 
 that it assists in lulling them to sleep. 
 
 22. CRICKETS OF THE FIELD. 
 
 WHILE taking our evening rambles over the field, we 
 sometimes hear the cheerful summer cry of the field 
 cricket. But they are so sly and cautious, says White, 
 that it is difficult to obtain sight of one of these sonor- 
 ous animals ; for, feeling a person's footsteps as he ad- 
 vances, they stop short in the midst of their song, and 
 retire backward, nimbly into their burrows, until all 
 suspicion of danger is over. 
 
92 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 There is one way, however, by which any one may 
 obtain his wish, by gently pushing a limber stalk into 
 their burrows, which will probe their windings to the 
 bottom. This will quickly bring out the animal as it 
 lays hold of the stalk with its paws. 
 
 When the males meet, they fight fiercely, as White 
 found by some which he put into the crevices of a dry 
 stone wall, where he wanted them to settle. The first 
 that got possession of the crevices would attack any 
 that tried to enter. They, would seize them with their 
 strong jaws, which are toothed like the shears of a lob- 
 ster-claw. With these jaws, too, they bore and round 
 their curious cells. 
 
 They feed on such herbs as grow before the mouths 
 of their burrows, and rarely stir more than two or three 
 inches from home. Sitting in the entrance of their cav- 
 erns, they chirp all night as well as all day, from the 
 month of May to the middle of July. In hot weather, 
 when they are most vigorous, they make the hill echo ; 
 and in the still hours of darkness, they may be heard at 
 considerable distance. 
 
 23. BUSY BEES. 
 
 IT requires a busy pen to write about busy bees. 
 There is the bumble bee sporting in a yellow and black 
 jacket, and sometimes called Bombus. What brave 
 boy in the country has not at some time made a hero 
 of himself by attacking a bumble bees' nest ? 
 
 We learn that Bombus, if undisturbed in her hum- 
 
BUSY BEES. 93 
 
 ble home, does some valuable work, though she has no 
 honey to spare. Because she has a longer tongue than 
 the honey bee has, she can reach the nectar in the deep 
 corolla of a red clover flower ; and in so doing she car- 
 ries the pollen from one stem to another, thus enabling 
 the flower to bear seed. No bumble bees, no clover 
 seed. The people in New Zealand tried to raise clover 
 and failed. Why? The bumble bee was not there. 
 So they imported her, and, doubtless, were happy in 
 their sweet-scented crops of red clover. Truly great is 
 Bombus ! But we must let her go. 
 
 Queen. Drone. Worker. 
 
 The hive bee is our busy, curious, wonderful honey- 
 maker. The honey bee is a trinity the queen, the 
 drone, and the worker. All the three are necessary to 
 the life and prosperity of the colony, which may con- 
 tain fifty thousand busy people. The picture shows 
 the form peculiar to each of the three. The queen 
 is the mother of the whole colony. The worker-bees 
 respect and love her because she is mother. She 
 does not rule the workers, nor does she direct their 
 movements. The bee-government is purely a govern- 
 ment by the people. The workers can get rid of the 
 queen or make a new queen when they choose. 
 
 The workers are females, but as a rule lay no eggs. 
 
94 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The drones are males, but neither work nor sting ; for 
 the best of reasons because they have no tools for 
 working or stinging. The queen and the workers have 
 a sting in the abdomen. The workers defend the hive 
 by the use of this weapon, but they never attack when 
 abroad and about their work. The queen uses her 
 sting in combat with another queen, but never upon a 
 
 human hand ; so that 
 she may be handled 
 without danger. 
 
 All bees have com- 
 pound eyes. Ears, 
 or hearing organs, 
 they must have, for 
 the piping of the 
 young queen in her 
 cell sets the others 
 astir. They smell, 
 also, for they follow 
 the scent of unseen 
 honey. Where the 
 ears and nose are, it 
 is not certain. They 
 is also the sense of 
 
 Improved Hive. 
 
 may be in the antennae, where 
 feeling. 
 
 The business of bees is gathering food for themselves 
 and for their young. If they are well kept, they store 
 a great deal more honey than is necessary for this pur- 
 pose. From this abundance comes the honey which 
 human people use. To understand the work of bees 
 you must gather some flowers and have them explained 
 to you. The material which bees procure for their use 
 
R A 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 BUSY BEES. 
 
 is the sweet or nectar of flowers, and the pollen or 
 flower-dust. This pollen lies on the stamens of flow- 
 ers, and must be conveyed to the pistils in order that 
 the flower may ripen into seed or fruit. This explains 
 something about the clover already referred to. There 
 is also a sticky substance called propolis, with which 
 the bees fasten their comb to the hive or frames, and 
 which they gather from willow or alder trees. 
 
 The worker-bee's mouth is perfectly adapted to the 
 work of taking nectar from flowers. It has a long lip 
 and a much longer tongue. Jaws there are, too ; not 
 harsh ones like the beetle's, but strong enough to 
 serve the bees in working wax and bee-bread. Sup- 
 pose a queen and a few workers have weathered the 
 winter and are to commence their spring work. The 
 first thing they need, beside their daily food, is wax. 
 The workers start out for flowers and nectar. The 
 queen never works. 
 
 The sweet-scented flowers rarely yield nectar ; so 
 the workers find the red and golden maple, and among 
 later blossoms the flowers of apple, quince, raspberry, 
 white clover, and buckwheat. These they probe with 
 their tongues sometimes crawling into them and lick 
 up the nectar. This sweet goes to their stomachs, 
 where it is made into two things honey and wax. 
 The material for about twenty pounds of honey will 
 yield one pound of wax. 
 
 Bees have a fine sense of direction ; and when about 
 to return from their pastures, which they sometimes 
 follow as far as four miles from their hive, they rise 
 in the air and whirl round so as to see the familiar 
 objects about them, and then start off in a perfectly 
 
g LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 straight line, which is called a "bee-line." Having 
 filled themselves with nectar, and having taken a good 
 drink of water, they fly back to the hive, and hang 
 from its top in thick clusters or festoons, holding to 
 one another by their legs. In twenty-four hours, 
 small plates of wax appear in pouches on their under- 
 parts, or abdomens. 
 
 The workers shake the wax from their bodies, or 
 pick it out of the pouches with their feet ; then take 
 it in their jaws, work it over with saliva, and from it 
 
 build cells in double rows. A 
 great many are at work, and 
 they crowd one another close- 
 ly. Wonderful indeed are 
 these cells ! always six-sided ; 
 never round or square. Why 
 are they six-sided, and not 
 square? How awkward for 
 a round animal to turn in a 
 
 Hexagons and Circles. gquare fofe | But why nQt 
 
 round? With the diagram before you, these ques- 
 tions will be left for you to study upon. 
 
 Besides nectar for honey, pollen is required for bee- 
 bread. This is mixed with honey for ordinary food, 
 and is quite necessary in the preparation of baby-food 
 for the young or larvae. Should you ask a bee why, 
 in gathering pollen, she confines herself to one variety 
 of flowers at one time, she could, perhaps, give you 
 no reason, even if she could talk. To keep the dif- 
 ferent kinds of plants unmixed, it is necessary that 
 this should be so. 
 
 The pollen is scraped up and rolled into balls, and 
 
BUSY BEES. 97 
 
 then packed into little baskets at the middle joints of 
 the hind legs. The right foot is used to fill the left 
 pocket, and the left foot to fill the right pocket. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 THE cells are made for four different purposes for 
 the young workers, drones, and queens, and for stor- 
 ing honey. Four drone cells or five worker cells will 
 measure an" inch. The queen cell is larger. Honey 
 cells are not uniform in size, but are about a half inch 
 deep by a quarter inch in diameter. Remember the 
 queen lays all the eggs. She places a single egg in 
 each nursery cell, always being careful to deposit 
 worker eggs in worker cells, drone eggs in drone cells. 
 She makes no mistakes. The grown workers seal up 
 these cells, leaving little holes for air to enter, when 
 the young shall be hatched. The honey cells, when 
 filled, they always seal tight to keep the honey from 
 turning to candy. In about three days the eggs in the 
 cells are hatched, and the young appear in the shape 
 of small, white grubs or larvae. 
 
 Now some of the workers act as nurses, and are 
 busy preparing food for the young in their cells. 
 Pollen, honey, and water are mixed, and partly di- 
 gested in the stomachs of the nurses, and this mixture 
 is fed to the working and drone infants. A more 
 stimulating substance, called royal jelly, is given to 
 the queen-grubs, of which there are usually about five. 
 And, strange as it may seem, should all the queens be 
 destroyed, the workers will feed the royal jelly to a 
 
 worker-grub not more than three days old ; enlarge its 
 L. c.- 7 . 
 
Q 8 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 cell, and in due time it 
 will become a queen. In 
 five or six days the larvae 
 have attained their full 
 growth. Then they cease 
 to eat, spin about them- 
 selves silken cocoons, be- 
 come pupae, and the work- 
 ers seal their cells. In 
 twenty-one days from the 
 
 laying of the eggs, the perfect insects the full-grown 
 
 bees come forth. 
 
 About this time, which is likely to be in May or 
 
 June, swarming commences. The new workers and 
 
 drones are released from their cells, but not so the 
 
BUSY BEES. 99 
 
 queens. They are still confined, and are strongly 
 guarded by the workers, who bore holes in the cells, 
 through which openings they pass the food. The old 
 queen hears the piping of the royal prisoners, and be- 
 comes greatly excited ; and from jealousy would de- 
 stroy them if she could. Then a large portion of the 
 bees fill themselves with honey, and joining the old 
 queen, in a dense, whirling body leave the hive, and 
 cluster, it may be, on some branch from which they 
 are carefully swept into a basket, and are then put 
 into a new hive. 
 
 It is when the new swarm bursts forth, that some 
 people in the country raise a cry and a din with tin 
 pans and cow-bells, hoping by this means to make the 
 bees settle. Precisely this same practice was common 
 among the Romans more than two thousand years 
 ago. The old fashioned hive in this country is a piece 
 of a hollow tree, called a "gum." In Europe it is 
 made of straw, and has the shape of a little dome and 
 is quite picturesque. 
 
 The Romans used a hollow cork-tree. Our improved 
 hives have movable frames in which the bees make 
 their comb, as shown on page 94. In the lower part 
 of the hive are the brood combs and some of the 
 honey. In the upper part, in nice frames, in glass 
 boxes, or in other receptacles, the bees store their 
 surplus honey, and in these it is easily removed. 
 
 With the improved hives, the wild swarming and the 
 music of the tin pan may be prevented. Some of the 
 frames containing brood-comb may be gently taken out 
 and set into a new hive. The old queen may be found 
 and transferred to the new home ; or a queen cell, near 
 
100 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 the time of hatching, may be cut out and inserted in 
 the comb in the new hive. 
 
 If handled gently, bees are not apt to sting, though 
 the bee-hat and a little smoke are often made use of. 
 A very pretty case of swarming is told by a French 
 bee-keeper : ' ' A young girl of my acquaintance, who 
 was much afraid of bees, was completely cured of her 
 fear by the following incident : A swarm having come 
 off, I observed the queen alight by herself at a little 
 distance from the apiary (bee-house). I immediately 
 called my little friend, that I might show her the 
 queen. She wished to see her more closely. 
 
 "So after having caused her to put on her gloves, 
 I gave the queen into her hand. We were in an in- 
 stant surrounded by all the bees of the swarm. I en- 
 couraged the girl to be steady, bidding her be silent 
 and fear nothing. I then made her stretch out her right 
 hand, which held the queen, and covered her head and 
 shoulders with a very thin handkerchief. The swarm 
 soon fixed on her hand and hung from it as from the 
 branch of a tree. The little girl was delighted beyond 
 measure, and the spectators were charmed with the in- 
 teresting spectacle. At length I brought a hive, and, 
 shaking the swarm from her hand, it was lodged in 
 safety, and without inflicting a single wound." 
 
 The life of the first brood of workers is about six 
 weeks. Those hatched later in the season live longer, 
 and a few endure the winter. The queen may live four 
 years. The drones, which number about one thirtieth 
 part of a hive, are all slaughtered by the workers, dur- 
 ing the latter part of the summer. They are of no use 
 now. They neither work nor sting; and why should 
 
A NICE LITTLE HOUSEKEEPER. IOI 
 
 they be fed? Bee-life, like other insect life, like bird- 
 life, and man-life, is beset with struggles and dangers. 
 Bee-moths, rats, mice, woodpeckers, bee-martin birds, 
 toads, and bears are all after the little honey maker's 
 honey or its life. 
 
 24. A NICE LITTLE HOUSEKEEPER. 
 
 Jenny. WELL, Mrs. Ant, I am glad to see you here 
 again. I quite missed you. 
 
 Ant. I am much obliged to you for thinking of me, 
 Miss Jenny. However, I have not been away since 
 the last time I had the pleasure of meeting you. 
 
 Jenny. But I have seen nothing of you since last 
 October, though I have come to the nest several times 
 to inquire for you. 
 
 Ant. I assure you, Miss Jenny, I have not stirred 
 from this spot since last autumn, until yesterday, when 
 I came out for the first time, and we began our spring 
 house-cleaning and repairs, which you see are going on 
 very actively. 
 
 Jenny. I should like to see the interior of one of 
 your houses. 
 
 Ant (in great alarm). I hope you will not think of 
 examining one of them, Miss Jenny. It would afford 
 you very little gratification, and it would inflict great 
 injury on us. 
 
 Jenny. Do not be disturbed, Mrs. Ant. I have not 
 the least idea of digging up your nice nest and spoil- 
 
IO2 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 ing all your walls and galleries. But I should be glad 
 to have you tell me something about them. 
 
 Ant. I hardly know how to describe them to you, 
 my dear. We build almost entirely under ground, ex- 
 cavating arched chambers, sometimes round or oval, 
 but all well smoothed and hard finished. These are 
 connected by galleries. Some of our nests are three 
 or four feet deep, and occupy a large space, like this 
 one, which you see, has several different entrances. 
 
 Jenny. I should like to hear something more about 
 ants, if you are not too busy to talk to me. 
 
 Ant. O, I have nothing to do at present. This is 
 my resting-time, and I am glad to enjoy it, for I was 
 working all night. 
 
 Jenny. Do you work all night? 
 
 Ant. Sometimes, when it is moonlight, and we are 
 very busy. At this time of year, especially, v/hen 
 storms are frequent, we are very glad to avail ourselves 
 of every hour of dry weather. But as I am at leisure 
 I can answer all your questions. The nest of the 
 horse-ant consists, like ours, of a great many cells and 
 galleries ; though about half of their apartments are 
 above ground. They transport their young ones from 
 the upper to the lower stories, when it grows cold, and 
 back again when the sun shines out. There are other 
 ants which build their nest wholly in the earth. These 
 ants work only after sunset, and are very industrious 
 and ingenious. Their walls, pillars, and arches are all 
 made of soft clay, well worked and tempered. Each 
 ant brings in its mouth a morsel of clay and joins it 
 to the rest, smoothing it with her jaws and patting it 
 with her forefeet. 
 
A NICE LITTLE HOUSEKEEPER. 
 
 103 
 
 (One of the ants just at this point runs up to the speak- 
 er, and after patting her on the head with her feelers, hur- 
 ries away.") 
 
 Jenny. What did your friend do that for? 
 
 Ant. She told me in the ant's language, that there 
 was a lump of sugar lying in that flower-pot, and ad- 
 
 Jenny and the Ant. 
 
 vised me to go and help myself before it was all 
 eaten up. 
 
 Jenny. Did she say all that with those motions? I 
 did not hear her make any noise. 
 
 Ant. We never make a noise when we talk. We 
 talk altogether by signs. 
 
IO4 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Jenny. But why do you not go and share in the 
 feast with the others, Mrs. Ant? Do not let me de- 
 tain you, if you wish to go. 
 
 Ant. Thank you ; I do not care for it. I am going 
 to milk one of our cows by and by. 
 
 Jenny. Why, what do you mean ? 
 
 Ant. I am going to milk one of our cows, I say. 
 What is there surprising about that? Your father 
 keeps several cows, does he not? 
 
 Jenny. Why yes. But ants ! Pray how large are 
 your cows? 
 
 Ant. They are very small,- not quite so large as we 
 ourselves. Just turn up the leaves of that rose-bush. 
 There ! Do you not see a number of little pale green 
 insects? 
 
 Jenny. Yes ; I have often seen them before. They 
 are plant-lice, and they do a great deal of harm to the 
 shrubs. 
 
 Ant. Well, however that may be, the aphides, or 
 plant-lice, are our little cows, and yield us an abun- 
 dance of nice milk as sweet as honey. Very frequently 
 they live in the nest with us, feeding sometimes upon 
 the roots of the plants about us, and sometimes upon 
 the provisions we carry in for them. We take good 
 care of them and of their young, keeping their eggs in 
 the warmest part of the nest, in order that they may 
 hatch out early and so supply us in the spring. Now 
 I will milk one of them. You see I pat it gently with 
 my feelers, when it gives out two drops of clear sweet 
 fluid. These cows are our most valuable property, 
 and we should fight furiously, if any one should inter- 
 fere with them. 
 
A NICE LITTLE HOUSEKEEPER. IO5 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 Jenny. So you do fight sometimes. 
 
 Ant. Yes, indeed ; we have sharp battles, and often 
 leave half our number dead upon the field. These 
 combats sometimes take place between different races, 
 and sometimes between two colonies of the same 
 race. At such times you may see thousands of ants 
 biting, struggling, wrestling, and overturning each 
 other in the dust, till night puts an end to the combat. 
 
 Jenny. But what do they fight for? 
 
 Ant. Sometimes for one thing, sometimes for an- 
 other. Perhaps two parties have seized the same spi- 
 der or earth-worm, or the ants of one hill trespass upon 
 the pastures and seize the cows of another. But there 
 are ants who go out to war for the express purpose of 
 making prisoners, which they carry home to their nest. 
 
 Jenny. What do they do with them ? Not eat them, 
 I hope. 
 
 Ant. O, no not quite so bad as that. But these 
 prisoner ants do all the work of the nest afterwards. 
 The red ants, who are the fighters, start on these plun- 
 dering expeditions between two and five of the after- 
 noon of a fine day, first sending out ants to explore 
 about the hill they intend to attack. Upon the return 
 of these scouts, they set out,and having reached the col- 
 ony, they attack it with great fury. The dark-colored 
 ants, which they attack, defend themselves with great 
 bravery, but in vain. The red assailants are the strong- 
 est, and in a few minutes they may be seen coming 
 out, each with a young ant or an egg in her mouth, 
 
IO6 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 with which she hastens homeward. They take good 
 care of these slaves, who in turn take upon themselves 
 the whole work of the nest. They feed the young, 
 repair the dwelling, and lay up the provisions. They 
 even feed their masters putting the food into their 
 very mouths. Though these masters are such fighters, 
 they are very lazy, and will starve rather than wait on 
 themselves. 
 
 Jenny. What silly creatures ! I do not see any of 
 those dark-colored ants in your nest. 
 
 Ant. No ; we do our own work, and never interfere 
 with our neighbors so long as they do not trouble us. 
 We nurse our little ones, lay up our own provisions, 
 and all bear an equal share in the repairs and other 
 necessary labors about the nest. 
 
 Jenny. I should like very much to hear about your 
 little ones. I do not know that I have ever seen them. 
 
 Ant. You have seen them, though probably you 
 did not know what they were. In their immature, or 
 pupa state, they look very much like white seeds, or 
 very small fine grains of boiled rice. 
 
 Jenny. I have seen your friends carry such things 
 in and out of the nest, but I supposed they were lay- 
 ing something up for food. But why do they bite off 
 the ends? I have seen them do that sometimes. 
 
 Ant. That is to assist the young ant in making its 
 way out. You may have noticed that we take great 
 care of these eggs sometimes laying them in the sun, 
 sometimes carrying them into the interior of the nest. 
 
 Jenny. Yes ; I have often wondered what it was for. 
 
 Ant. In order that they may have just as much 
 heat as is good for them, and no more. A great part 
 
A NICE LITTLE HOUSEKEEPER. IO/ 
 
 of the duty of the workers consists in taking care of 
 the eggs and young ones, and in attending on the 
 queen and leading her about. 
 Jenny. Then you have a queen, do you ? 
 
 Ant. Yes ; but our queen is only the mother of the 
 community, and has no authority whatever over us. 
 She is, however, treated with the greatest respect and 
 affection by us all. Wherever she goes, we press 
 around her, offer her food, brush her dress for her, and 
 help her up steep ascents, and through narrow pas- 
 sages. As often as she goes through the nest, the 
 workers leave their occupation, pat her on the head and 
 breast, and stand on their hind legs, laying their fore- 
 feet on each other's shoulders, and thus dance about 
 her. Whenever she lays an egg, it is at once taken up 
 by a worker and carried to a place of safety. Some- 
 times there are two or three queens in the nest, but 
 they are all friendly and kind to each other. 
 
 Jenny. Does the queen never go out of the nest? 
 
 Ant. Never. It would be considered improper in 
 the highest degree for her to do so. Indeed, no sooner 
 is a female elected queen than she throws away her 
 wings, of her own accord, and never stirs out after- 
 wards. 
 
 Jenny. But what becomes of the males? 
 
 Ant. O, they die very soon after they come out. 
 They are tender, helpless creatures, and the first rude 
 wind or storm kills them. 
 
 Jenny. What is that upon the door-step? 
 
 Ant. O, I see. They have found a nice fat spider, 
 which has been killed in some way, and they are going 
 to take it to the nest for food. 
 
io8 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 25. BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS. 
 
 WHEN spring is marching to 'the music of birds, and 
 the leaves are unfolding to the warm sun, and the 
 dandelions lift their golden heads in the growing grass, 
 and the cows feed on sweet pastures, and yellow butter 
 gathers in the churn, then come the butterflies. 
 
 Fluttering around the pools on the country road 
 
 may be seen the boy's 
 butterfly, with a set 
 of bright, yellow 
 wings, which many a 
 boy seeks to imprison 
 with his new straw 
 hat. Thinking of the 
 butter in the churn, 
 it is easy to imagine 
 how this butterfly 
 came by its name. It 
 is also called colzas, and 
 later in the season it 
 will sport its wings 
 among the blooming 
 clover. 
 
 From the common yellow butterfly the name easily 
 passes to the great multitude of cousins, though they 
 be brown, or black, or variegated in color. Many are 
 their sizes as well as their colors, and different families 
 'have different shapes. When summer has fairly come, 
 in our temperate climate, the swallow-tailed butterflies 
 appear. A common one wears a rich dress of yellow 
 
 Yellow Butterfly Colias. 
 
BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS. 
 
 and black, and belongs to a family called papilio quite 
 a pretty name. 
 
 Moths, of which something particular will soon be 
 said, are naturally thought of with butterflies. The 
 common ones are clad in sober dress. Under the mi- 
 croscope, the wings of all butterflies and moths disclose 
 beauties not seen by the naked eye. What commonly 
 appears to be colored dust, and rubs off the wings 
 under the touch of a finger, the microscope proves to 
 be very fine, shiny, or irridescent scales. As if these 
 wings had been sprinkled with powdered rainbow. 
 Butterflies and moths, on this account, are called scale- 
 winged insects. 
 
 When visiting flowers, the scale-winged insect is 
 seeking its food, which is the sweet juice of flowers. 
 It has a long, tubular tongue or proboscis, which is 
 rolled up when not in use, and is unrolled and stretched 
 out, when the bottom of a flower is to be reached. 
 
 The few weeks that Papilio lives are busy ones. 
 When not gathering food 
 she is finding the apple or 
 wild thorn, perhaps, for 
 a birthplace for her fut- 
 
 Caterpillar of Papilio. 
 
 ure children. She never 
 
 sees her children. Very fortunate, you may think, 
 when you come to know that her infants are ugly, 
 crawling caterpillars. 
 
 The truth is, that these ugly babes can take care of 
 themselves from the moment they are born, if they are 
 born in the right place. They are hatched from eggs, 
 in some cases beautiful eggs, shaped like vases and 
 caskets. These eggs are fastened to the leaves of 
 
1 10 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 plants; and the mother, during her brief life, is seek- 
 ing to deposit her treasures upon that particular plant 
 which, after her caterpillar infants are hatched, will 
 afford them their proper food. 
 
 Does the child resemble its mother? Look at both 
 very carefully. The caterpillar is composed of thir- 
 teen rings joined together. The three main parts of 
 
 Swallow-tailed Butterfly Papilio. 
 
 the butterfly's body show the traces of as many rings. 
 The caterpillar has six jointed legs on three of the 
 rings behind its head, quite like the six legs of its 
 mother. These remain with it through life. The four 
 pairs of legs on the rear part of its body called pro- 
 legs are soft, and disappear after a while. The but- 
 terfly breathes through holes in its body as does the 
 
BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS. Ill 
 
 fly; so the caterpillar has breathing holes through 
 which the air passes in to meet the blood. 
 
 The habits of the two are very different. The one 
 flies, the other crawls. The mother sips nectar from 
 flowers, and has a small stomach like a thread. The 
 child is nearly all stomach, and feeds upon leaves. Its 
 destructiveness may be judged by the enormous amount 
 it eats. The first day of its life it eats twice its own 
 weight. At the end of a month it may have eaten 
 forty thousand times its weight. By this greediness it 
 lays away a large store of fat. 
 
 To accommodate so rapid a growth, the caterpillar 
 needs a new and larger suit of clothes, now and then. 
 Its life is only a few weeks long, and during this time 
 it changes its skin six times. The skin splits down 
 the back and is shuffled off. The skins of some are 
 smooth ; of others are hairy, or covered with stiff 
 bristles, to protect them against other in- 
 sects and against birds. 
 
 After a time this ugly child of a beau- 
 tiful mother ceases to eat. It abandons 
 the green leaf of apple, or clover, or 
 cabbage upon which it has been feed- 
 ing, throws off its skin and the lining 
 of its stomach, and becomes a pupa. 
 Under its chin is a little spinner from 
 which issues a silken thread. One pa- Hanging Chry8alis - 
 pilio fastens its tail to a support and runs a silk thread 
 around the middle of its body to hold it secure. Some 
 kinds merely hang from the tail. In this state it re- 
 mains from ten to fifteen days, and is called a chrysa- 
 lis which means gold-colored sheath because some 
 
112 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 pupae are surrounded by a case ornamented with golden 
 
 spots, as if fastened with nails of gold. 
 
 Is the chrysalis a little coffin with a corpse within ? 
 
 No, indeed ; there is a wonderful life in progress. 
 
 Feelers, tongue, legs, and beautiful wings are grow- 
 ing. But what does this life feed upon ? 
 Ah ! now we have found what that ter- 
 ribly greedy caterpillar was doing when 
 it was eating up our leaves so outrage- 
 ously. It was laying away fat which 
 feeds the pupa in the chrysalis, as the 
 hump supports the life of the camel 
 when he is without his customary food. 
 Well, in due time, if no enemy has 
 torn it away, the chrysalis splits open 
 sound chrysalis. and the i ma g O> t h e perfect butterfly 
 
 comes forth, dries its wings, and flies away full-grown. 
 The ugly child is at last as beautiful as its mother, and 
 as large as she ; and it never grows any more. 
 
 26. THE SILK-WORM. 
 
 BUTTERFLIES fly in the day-time ; most moths fly by 
 night. When the butterfly rests, its wings are raised 
 over its back ; when the moth lights, its wings remain 
 flat and extended. Most moths have their wings 
 joined. A bristle in the rib of the hind wing passes 
 through a loop in the fore wing. 
 
 The antennae of the butterfly stretch out nearly 
 
THE SILK-WORM. 113 
 
 straight, and end in knobs ; those of the moth curve, 
 and in nearly all cases are without knobs. Butterfly- 
 caterpillars spin a little; moth-caterpillars spin much 
 more. Some of them make their pupa cases, or co- 
 coons, entirely of silk. 
 
 Moths usually wear sober colors. Some are very 
 gay and brilliant. Some are large, and others are very 
 small. The great owl moth of Brazil measures nearly 
 a foot between the tips of its wings. Our little clothes- 
 moth expands scarcely a half inch. Some moth-cat- 
 erpillars are smooth. Others are covered with bristles 
 or spines; stiil others emit an offensive odor all for 
 protection against their enemies. 
 
 Moths are more destructive than butterflies. The 
 clothes-moth feeds on woolen and furs. The canker 
 worm eats the leaves of cherry, plum, and elm. The 
 tussock-moth-caterpillar preys upon pear and apple 
 trees. The fall web-worm allows very few trees to es- 
 cape its mischievous horny jaws. The tomato-worm, 
 the tobacco-worm, the cotton-worm are great destroy- 
 ers. And all these so-called "worms" are the cater- 
 pillars of moths. There is one moth-caterpillar, how- 
 ever, whose destruction is turned to good account, and 
 a short history of it must be given. 
 
 It is the mulberry silk-worm, so called because its 
 favorite food is the mulberry-tree. Not our native 
 tree of that name, but the imported white mulberry. 
 Prof. Riley, of Washington, has, for nearly fifteen years, 
 kept silk-worms on the leaves of the common osage 
 orange ; and their silk proved to be of excellent quality. 
 This moth-caterpillar has a wonderful history, reach- 
 ing back, it is thought, as far as two thousand years 
 
 L. C. 8. 
 
114 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 before Christ. China, now famous for its silk indus- 
 try, is supposed to be its original home. 
 
 For thousands of years, so the story goes, the 
 Chinese would not allow the eggs of their silk-moth to 
 go out of the country. At length, about the year 550, 
 two monks are said to have brought away to Europe 
 a few eggs concealed in their canes. The silk-worm 
 is now a purely domestic animal like the dog. So long, 
 indeed, has it been fed by human hands, that it has 
 lost the power of flight, and is wholly dependent on. 
 human care* 
 
 Though the cultivation of silk-worms occupies but 
 a few months in the year, it requires great care. 
 
 It can not be success- 
 fully conducted on a 
 large scale. It is good 
 work for women and 
 aged people, while it 
 brings a pleasant little 
 income to add to the 
 profits of the farmer. 
 
 Silk-worm Moth (after Riley.) 
 
 A single silk-moth 
 
 lays about four hundred eggs, and an ounce of eggs 
 will number about thirty-five thousand. During the 
 winter the eggs are kept in proper boxes in the cellar. 
 When the foliage is sufficiently started in the spring to 
 furnish them food, the eggs are brought into a warm 
 room the silk-worm room where they hatch in five 
 or six days. 
 
 When about to hatch, the eggs are spread out upon 
 a clean sheet of paper, and over them is laid a mos- 
 quito netting, on which are scattered fresh cut leaves 
 
THE SILK-WORM. U5 
 
 of mulberry. As soon as hatched, the worms crawl 
 through the holes of the netting and begin to feed. 
 They are then carried on the net to the table where 
 they are to remain. A busy place is the silk-worm 
 room, after life begins. The worms are fed twice a day. 
 The newly hatched caterpillar is black or gray, and 
 is covered with long, stiff hairs. By and by it grows 
 into a cream color, and its hairs disappear. It eats its 
 own weight of leaves every day. During the few days 
 before beginning to spin, it consumes more than during 
 its whole previous existence. To make room for its 
 rapid increase it changes its skin four times at intervals 
 of from four to ten days. This experience in the silk- 
 worm is called ''sickness." The time from hatching 
 to spinning is about forty days. 
 
 Silk-worm Caterpillar (after Riley). 
 
 When about to spin, the worm ceases to feed and 
 throws out threads. The silk comes from a fluid 
 within, which issues from a spinneret just beneath the 
 lower lip. As the air strikes the fluid it hardens. 
 First the worm throws around itself a loose silk called 
 floss, as a sort of frame- work. Then within this it 
 spins a tough, strong, continuous thread, not in circles, 
 or round and round, but back and forth in loops like 
 a figure 8. A single cocoon may contain a thread 
 four thousand yards long, or about two and a quarter 
 miles long. The work occupies three or four days. 
 
Il6 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Imagine how active the head of that creature must be 
 during these few days. 
 
 The silken house thus made looks like a pea-nut. 
 When it is finished, the worm once more puts off its 
 old skin, which it packs into a wad, and crowds away 
 in the end of the cocoon. Now it changes into a 
 pupa, and so remains for two or three weeks. 
 
 When the cocoons are wanted for silk, as most of 
 them are, and not for rearing moths for eggs, the pupa 
 within is killed or choked by steam, or by setting the 
 cocoons on a tray in an oven heated to a certain de- 
 gree of temperature. After the operation of choking, 
 the cocoons are dried in the air and are ready for reel- 
 ing. It takes from three hundred to four hundred 
 fresh cocoons, or three times as many choked cocoons, 
 to weigh a pound. Of the former, a pound is worth 
 about thirty-five cents, and of the latter, a pound is 
 worth about one dollar. 
 
 The reeling of silk from the cocoons is a nice and 
 delicate operation.. W T hen reeled, the product is known 
 as raw silk, and is ready to be twisted into thread and 
 to be woven into cloth. 
 
 27. FACTS ABOUT INSECTS. 
 
 THE dragon-fly seen about ponds, darting here and 
 there on four beautifully colored, gauze-like, net-veined 
 wings, is by the French called demoiselle (dem wa- 
 zel') which means a young lady. Devil's darning- 
 
FACTS ABOUT INSECTS. 1 1/ 
 
 needle, and mosquito hawk are its popular names. The 
 last name indicates a work these hawks do which 
 ought to make friends for them. They never walk ; 
 they are always on the wing. Watch them closely and 
 see how they dart from right to left in the air, appar- 
 ently without moving their wings. 
 
 Crickets and grasshoppers will be associated together 
 on account of their long, springing hind legs. The 
 first pair of their wings are 
 called wing-covers, because 
 they cover the second pair 
 which are folded under like 
 fans. Their mouths are adapt- 
 ed to biting. The mole- 
 cricket does not hop, and 
 has forefeet shaped for bur- Dra g on- fly . 
 
 rowing, much like the digging-feet of the common mole. 
 In the same group are included the katydid and the 
 cockroach. 
 
 The katydid, which utters its sleepy music, begin- 
 ning about the middle of July, is pure green in color, 
 like the foliage among which it hides. Both it and 
 the cricket make their shrilling sound by rubbing to- 
 gether the wing-covers near the place where they join 
 the body. These wings have heavy, rough veins. 
 
 Bugs are distinguished from other insects by a pro- 
 boscis or beak, which is fitted to pierce the bark of 
 plants or the skin of animals from which they derive 
 their nourishment. Crickets are biters ; bugs are pierc- 
 ers. Among the true bugs may be mentioned the 
 aphis, or plant-louse ; the chinch-bug, which is said to 
 have cost the Illinois farmers four millions of dollars 
 
Il8 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 in a single year by destroying their crops ; the lice 
 that afflict human beings and birds; the bed-bug which 
 infests pigeons, swallows, and human habitations. The 
 last two offensive creatures have no wings, and the 
 cockroach takes delight in destroying the larger insect 
 of the two. 
 
 The cicada (cica'da) or harvest fly, improperly called 
 locust, is a bug with a piercing beak which does also 
 the work of a saw. This bug appears 
 in the latter part of summer, when it 
 produces a familiar sound by forcing 
 the air into a ribbed or fluted ket- 
 tle-drum situated in its abdomen. It 
 bores holes in the twigs of trees to 
 lay its eggs in. It is not particularly 
 injurious. 
 
 Another cicada, called the seven- 
 teen-year-locust, appears in some parts 
 
 Cicada-Under side. Qf ^ CQuntry Qnce j n seventeen 
 
 years ; in other places once in thirteen years. It some- 
 times does great mischief. So deep does it bore into 
 the apple-tree twigs that they fall off, and much fruit 
 is lost. After the eggs are deposited, the parent 
 dies and never sees its offspring. The young, when 
 hatched, fall to the ground, and seem to know enough 
 to burrow into the ground, where they remain during 
 the many years of their quiet babyhood, living on the 
 juices of roots. 
 
 Beetles are sheath-winged insects. Their fore-wings 
 are horny in substance, and are used for wing-covers 
 only, and not for flight. Beetles are biters and chew- 
 ers, having for this purpose strong jaws, working, of 
 
FACTS ABOUT INSECTS. lip 
 
 course, horizontally. May-bugs, pinch-bugs, and po- 
 tato-bugs, are not bugs, but are beetles. 
 
 One of the most interesting of this order of insects 
 is the tumble-bug, which was held sacred by the Egyp- 
 tians, and whose figure is inscribed on their monu- 
 ments. Our tumble-bugs are nearly like it. The ball 
 they roll, often up hill, one pulling and the other 
 
 Egyptian Tumble-bugs. 
 
 pushing, contains an egg. The little globe is composed 
 of the droppings of horses and cattle; and this ma- 
 terial seems to be selected because it will become heat- 
 ed, and thus help the egg to hatch. A hole is sunken 
 in the ground to receive the ball, and to this nest the 
 struggling little heroes are trying to move their rolling 
 treasure. 
 
 The insect races are more numerous than the tribes 
 or species of other animals. The number of different 
 kinds of beetles, alone, which have been examined, is 
 about a hundred thousand. 
 
I2O LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 FLIES have each but one pair of wings, and include 
 gnats, mosquitoes, horse-flies, blue-bottle flies, and a 
 host of others. The "blue-bottle" is larger than the 
 house-fly, and is regarded as a pest and an enemy to the 
 housekeeper and the butcher. Blue-bottle flies are at- 
 tracted by the smell of meat, and manage to deposit 
 their eggs upon this food, though it be covered with 
 wire netting or with cloth. The eggs hatch in about 
 twenty-four hours, and the larvae are the maggots which 
 are so detestable. However, this vexatious visitor does 
 a great deal of good by helping to get rid of decaying 
 animal matter. 
 
 How wonderful is the increase of flies ! Mr. Keller, 
 an English naturalist, has calculated that the early fly 
 lays eighty eggs at each of four times during the sea- 
 son. The first generation after her lay four times ; the 
 second three times, the third once; and the offspring 
 of these again deposit eggs, so that, should all the 
 eggs hatch and produce flies, the original fly would be 
 the parent and grand parent of two millions of chil- 
 dren. Enemies and accidents must remove a great 
 many of the eggs or of the young flies. 
 
 Many insects seek to deposit their eggs upon the. 
 substance that furnishes the proper food for the larvae 
 which are hatched from their eggs. For this reason 
 the blue-bottle fly searches for meat ; the potato-beetle 
 finds the potato plant ; and the moth of the tomato- 
 worm deposits upon the tomato or the potato vine. 
 Sometimes a mistake is made. A meat-eating insect 
 
FACTS ABOUT INSECTS. 121 
 
 has fastened its eggs to a plant which has the odor of 
 meat, and the young, when hatched, died. 
 
 A lady in Missouri, who watches insects closely, 
 found that a certain butterfly which deposits its eggs 
 upon the wormwood plant, when this plant was scarce, 
 selected a kind of artemisia, which in some respects 
 resembles the wormwood. When the larvae hatched 
 they died of starvation, because the artemisia was not 
 their proper food. 
 
 The tribe of insects, which includes bees and ants, 
 embraces other kinds that attract attention. Never kill 
 a wasp until you have seen the ingenious house she 
 has built, and which she has covered with sixteen 
 thicknesses of paper. Long before paper was invented, 
 and when men were scratching their thoughts on bark 
 and chips and skins, this little cousin of the bee and 
 the ant was gathering the fiber of wood, chewing 
 and spreading it out as thin as a letter sheet. The 
 wasp was the first paper-maker. 
 
 Wait a moment while you dip your pen in ink. 
 What is good black ink made of? One thing very 
 necessary to it is an acid that is found in oak-galls. 
 This acid is called gallic acid. What makes the oak- 
 galls, or oak-apples, as they are commonly called? 
 Toward the close of the growing season, our red oak 
 sometimes bears a large number of these galls. The 
 galls that help to make the best ink come from China. 
 
 The gall is not a natural fruit of the oak, but is pro- 
 duced by an insect ; in some cases by an aphis or 
 louse, in other cases by a gall-fly which is cousin to 
 the wasp. This insect stings the oak-twig to make a 
 place for its egg. Around this wound with an egg in 
 
122 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 it, the tree produces an apple-like swelling in which 
 the sap turns to an acid. The gall-fly, therefore, is the 
 ink-maker, as the. wasp is the paper-maker. 
 
 The sting of the stinging insects, such as bees, 
 wasps, and so forth, is at the end of the abdomen. 
 The same organ is used to deposit the eggs. The 
 wasp saves her sting after inflicting a wound ; the bee 
 usually leaves her sting in the wound and then dies, 
 because the sting takes away a part of her bowels. A 
 very intelligent gentleman has found that the wasp 
 fails to make a painful sting if, when she begins to 
 pierce the skin, he holds his breath. This experiment 
 can easily be tried by stirring up a wasp's nest. 
 
 PART 3. 
 
 THE agricultural ants of Texas have been patiently 
 and carefully watched by Rev. Mr. McCook. These 
 ants clear away the weeds and grass from a piece of 
 ground seven to twelve feet in diameter. Nothing is 
 permitted to grow on the cleared space, or disk, ex- 
 cept a needle-grass which is called ant-rice. This 
 plant they allow to grow, that they may gather the 
 seed which it bears, and store it away in their under- 
 ground galleries for winter use. On this account they 
 are called harvesting ants, and they fulfill the words of 
 King Solomon: "The ants are a people not strong, 
 yet they prepare their meat in summer." 
 
 For such very insignificant creatures that are only 
 about a half inch long, the clearing of this farm is a 
 tremendous work. But they work together, and they 
 work with a will. With their jaws they cut, pinch, 
 
FACTS ABOUT INSECTS. 
 
 I2 3 
 
 Agricultural Ants. 
 
 pull, twist, and tear. Sometimes one climbs to the 
 top of a weed and bends it over by her weight, while 
 another cuts it off near the ground. When bearing 
 their burdens along the roads which they make, one 
 does not turn out to let his fellow pass, but walks 
 right over him. Among themselves they never quar- 
 rel. They help one another out of difficulties. They 
 work a while and then rest. When eating they some- 
 times sit up like squirrels. 
 
 Much time is spent by them in combing and clean- 
 
124 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 ing themselves. One ant cleans its fellow. It lifts 
 the fellow's leg and licks it ; then li-cks the fellow's 
 head and neck; then the breast. Then the cleaner 
 goes away the fellow cleansed "all this time," says 
 Mr. McCook, "seeming pleased as a dog when his 
 back is scratched." 
 
 Ants talk by signs. When a slave-making ant is 
 hungry, it will pat the head of its slave with its feel- 
 ers ; then the servant immediately supplies the wants 
 of its mistress. The sign for marching is a tap on 
 the side. The red ants will sometimes starve rather 
 than help themselves. Some ants, therefore, are slug- 
 gards; and it was not to these, but to the harvesting 
 ant that Splomon bid the human sluggard go. 
 
 Ants are very strong, and a single one will carry in 
 its jaws a burden twenty-five times its own weight. 
 Ants have their seasons of play, when they jump, 
 caper, and dance on their hind legs. They wrestle, 
 and carry one another in their mouths. 
 
 28. AMONG THE FISHES. 
 
 WHEN one steps into the water and finds how easily 
 he sinks, the swimming of fishes seems a little mys- 
 terious. The puzzle arises, not when the swimmers 
 are in motion, for we ourselves can swim by the proper 
 use of arms and legs. The fish at rest, with motion- 
 less fins and tail, as if standing in the water this is 
 what we wonder at. 
 
 The puzzle is far from being a knotty one. The 
 boy is much heavier than the amount of water which 
 
AMONG THE DISHES. 
 
 125 
 
 his body displaces. Not so with the fish. Its weight 
 is much more nearly as light as the water in which it 
 swims. Then there is the swimming bladder, which 
 young fishers find within the fish, lying just under the 
 backbone. This connects with the mouth, and is 
 filled with air or emptied, at the will of the fish. Hence 
 it is quite easy for the finny creature to rise or drop 
 in the water, and to stand still, with little or no mo- 
 tion of the fins. 
 
 A common river-chub must be called up here that 
 the names of fins and other parts may be learned. 
 Behind the head are the pectoral fins (//), one on 
 
 Fig. 11. Common Chub. 
 
 each side. Still further back and below are the ventral 
 fins(>/), another pair. These pectoral and ventral fins 
 correspond to the arms and legs of human creatures, or 
 to the fore and hind legs of quadrupeds. On the back 
 is the dorsal fin (df\ Some fishes have two dorsal 
 fins. On the under side near the tail hangs the anal 
 fin (af). Then comes the tail, or caudal fin (<:/). 
 
 The pectoral and ventral fins enable the fish to bal- 
 ance itself so as not to turn over on its side. The 
 dorsal and anal fins keep it in a straight line when it 
 moves, while the tail fin is the oar or scull, which 
 works from side to side, and makes the fish go. The 
 
 or THK 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
126 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 eye has no lid. The nostrils are a little in front of the 
 eyes. The ears' where are they? Fishes hear, be- 
 cause gold-fishes kept in ponds are trained to come to 
 their meals at the ringing of a little bell. 
 
 Some fishes make noises, evidently for the purpose 
 of calling their mates. The cat-fish utters a gentle, 
 humming sound, perhaps to call its young; for it 
 broods its young as a hen broods her chickens. Fish 
 
 Bull-head. 
 
 have organs for hearing, and these are near the back 
 of the head. They are covered not open; and the 
 hearing nerve connects with the air-bladder, as if to 
 carry sound through the body. The sense of touch is 
 in the lips. Bull-heads and cat-fish have Jong barbels 
 hanging from the sides of their mouths. Quite, likely 
 these are feelers like the whiskers of a cat. From 
 this resemblance the cat-fish gets its name. 
 
 On the side of the head is the gill cover (gc}. 
 You may watch its motion in the gold-fish or the min- 
 now. The gills within are so arranged as to bring the 
 cold red blood of the fish in contact with the air 
 which is mixed in the water. The water passes in 
 at the mouth, over the gills, and out under the gill 
 
AMONG THE FISHES. 12J 
 
 covers. This is the way in which the fish breathes. 
 Some kinds of fish have teeth in the jaws, while oth- 
 ers are toothless. Their food is mostly worms, in- 
 sects, and other fish; though some, like the pond- 
 carp, feed on vegetable matter. The mode of eating 
 is to swallow the food whole; and this explains the 
 reason why fish may be caught with a hook. No fish 
 would be apt to swallow a hook after chewing it. 
 
 Sucker. 
 
 The fish impresses us as a bony animal, indeed very 
 bony. It has a backbone, and its skeleton is inside 
 of its soft parts instead of outside, as is the case with 
 insects. Nothing is easier than to examine the skel- 
 eton of a fish when it lies on the dinner-plate. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 THE scientific and sporting books have a way of 
 speaking slightingly of certain fishes as "boys' fish." 
 Thus they put aside the common sucker as "one of 
 the numerous tribe of boys' fish which may be found 
 on every urchin's string." Here is a list of the boys' 
 fish : ' Minnows, chubs, roach, dace, shiners, and suck- 
 
I2& LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 ers. These are popular with boys, and with girls, too, 
 because they may be found in small streams and ponds, 
 where there is slight danger of being drowned. They 
 bite readily, and when caught, are easily handled, be- 
 cause they have no 
 teeth in the mouth, 
 and their fins are soft. 
 The boys' list, it 
 must be confessed, 
 are all poor eating. 
 Thoreau says, "the 
 chub is a soft fish ; it 
 
 tastes like a piece of brown paper salted." Without 
 doubt this is the solemn truth ; but who can make a 
 boy believe it, particularly if he has himself caught a 
 chub ? The first fish I ever caught was a beautiful sil- 
 ver shiner about six inches long. All these small, soft 
 fish seem to have bones mixed up with their flesh as if 
 to stiffen their sides, like corsets. When my little 
 shiner was cooked and on my plate, I found it terribly 
 full of bones. Nevertheless, no one could convince me 
 that it was not the most delicious morsel in the world. 
 When the young fisherman or fisherwoman finds a 
 sunfish (pumpkin seed) taken by the hook, then the 
 boys' list is left behind, and something like the "game 
 fish" is reached. A game fish is one which makes good 
 eating, bites vigorously, and, when once hooked, resists 
 so earnestly as to make the catching exciting. The lit- 
 tle, nearly round sunfish is one of a group of cousins 
 which includes the yellow perch, the log-perch or rock- 
 perch, and all other perches ; the yellow bass, the white 
 bass, the black bass, the striped bass of the se, and 
 
AMONG THE FISHES. 
 
 I2 9 
 
 Sunflsh. 
 
 the delicious crappie of the Mississippi River. You 
 will notice that all these fishes have on the back, in 
 front of the usual dorsal fin, a first dorsal fin composed 
 of very sharp spines. You will be more impressed 
 with the sharpness of 
 these fins when you 
 come to take a bold, 
 wriggling, spiny fish off 
 your hook. Look out 
 for the spines ! 
 
 Another company of 
 cousins is the salmon 
 family. They have 
 soft fins but fierce teeth. The great salmon, which run 
 up the large rivers from the sea to deposit their eggs in 
 small streams so that the young fry may be far away 
 from their enemies these are called the monarchs 
 among all game fish. No cat can climb a tree more 
 nimbly than a salmon will shoot up the rapids, or leap 
 up a rushing fall of water. With the salmon belong 
 the lake trout, the white fish of the Great Lakes, and 
 the exquisite brook, or speckled trout. These fish are 
 without the large scales which belong to most fresh- 
 water fish. 
 
 The little bull-head with its barbels hanging from its 
 lips, and with a head nearly as large as the remainder 
 of its body, is a near relative of the different kinds of 
 cat-fishes which inhabit rivers, lakes, and sea. The cat- 
 fish of the Mississippi often weighs a hundred and fifty 
 pounds. 
 
 The cat-fish of Central Europe weighs as high as four 
 hundred pounds. Cat-fish are all hungry, barbarous, and 
 
 L. C.-9. 
 
I3O LIVING CREATURES, 
 
 cruel ; and scarcely any fish escapes their jaws, except 
 the spiny perch family. Of the European cat, great 
 fish stories are told. One was said to have swallowed 
 a woman with a ring and a purse of gold. An appar- 
 ently true account, however, states that on the 3d of 
 July, 1700, a cat-fish was caught at Thorn, Prussia, in 
 the stomach of which a small child was found. But 
 
 California Flying-fish. 
 
 none of these stories need alarm the young fisher of 
 bull-head or pout. 
 
 In mudholes and ponds in the country, are some- 
 times seen worms which look like animated horse-hairs. 
 Country boys are sometimes told that these wriggling 
 swimmers actually come from horse hairs accident- 
 
AMONG THE FISHES. 13! 
 
 ally dropped in the water. A still more foolish story 
 is that eels grow from hair-worms. The truth is that 
 the hair-worm comes from an egg, like other worms, 
 and the eel is a real fish. A strange sort of fish, un- 
 doubtedly. It has the head of a fish, though without 
 gill covers,* and it has also 'a pectoral fin. Its dorsal 
 and anal fins run along nearly one third of the body. 
 Eels are found most abundantly in those waters which 
 communicate with the sea. 
 
 The flying-fish and the stickleback must have a word. 
 The former, to escape its pursuing enemy, with a 
 spring of its tail, leaps into the air. Its pectoral fins, 
 you observe, are developed something like wings. The 
 California flyer ' ' flies for a distance sometimes of nearly 
 a quarter of a mile, usually not rising more than four 
 feet. When on the wing it resembles a large dragon- 
 
 fly." 
 
 The little sticklebacks are found in some rivers on 
 the Atlantic coast. The black bass is 
 one of the few fishes that take any care 
 of their young. It builds a saucer-like 
 
 *. Stickleback. 
 
 nest on the bottom, where the eggs 
 are deposited, and where, when hatched, the fry are 
 carefully protected. But the stickleback builds a nest 
 somewhat like that of a bird. The male gathers weeds 
 and erects a barrel-shaped house. He secretes a mar- 
 velous kind of mucous in his body, which, as soon as it 
 comes in contact with the water, grows firm and hard. 
 With this he cements his nest. Sticklebacks, on ac- 
 count of this interesting architecture, are sometimes 
 confined in aquariums. Their nests in the water are 
 often the subjects of pleasant pictures. 
 
132 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 29. ROMAN FISH FONDS. 
 
 EELS are to the sea what hawks and owls are to the 
 air. They are the terror of most other fish, and they 
 attack their prey by day aiid by night. Hidden in the 
 mud or beneath some overhanging rock, they dart out 
 with open mouths and with great fury. The murry eel 
 abounds in the Mediterranean Sea, and in nearly 
 all warm seas. It does not hesitate, when oppor- 
 tunity offers, to satisfy its appetite by attacking human 
 flesh. This fact shows that the story of Pollio, which 
 is here given nearly in the words of Mr. Houghton, is 
 quite probable. 
 
 Red mullet and murries seem to have been special 
 favorites with the old Romans like Hortensius, "those 
 blessed fish-pond gentlemen," of whom Cicero speaks 
 with contempt. The murry was highly esteemed for 
 the delicacy of its flesh, and for its fine flavor. These 
 murries would become so tame that they would come 
 at their master's call, and take food from his hand. 
 Hortensius actually shed bitter tears when a favorite 
 murry died in his ponds. 
 
 Another celebrated Roman, named Crassus, had an 
 equally tender heart. He could not stop his tears at 
 the death of his fishy darling. But he had a ready 
 wit as well as a soft heart. When his brother-senator, 
 Domitius, called '' Brazen-head, " twitted him in the 
 Senate for having cried as much at the death of an eel 
 as if he had lost a daughter, Crassus replied that it 
 was more than old Brazen-head had done for any one 
 of his deceased wives ! 
 
ROMAN FISH PONDS. 13$ 
 
 Varro, a Roman writer, says: "A friend of mine, 
 Hortensius by name, had fish ponds at Bauli, con- 
 structed at great cost. I have often been with him at 
 his residence, and I know that, instead of eating his 
 own fish, he would send to Puteoli and buy fish. He 
 used to feed the fish with his own hands, and would 
 show a great deal more anxiety, if his mullets were 
 hungry, than I showed when my asses wanted feed- 
 ing. I am content with one slave to feed my asses. 
 Hortensius employs a host of fishermen who are con- 
 
 common Eel. 
 
 tinually sent out to catch heaps of little fish for big 
 ones to eat. He felt more anxiety about a sick fish 
 than about a sick slave." 
 
 Hurries are the fish which, according to Pliny and 
 others, a certain Roman knight named Pollio kept. 
 Pollio was a friend of the Emperor Augustus. He 
 used to feed his fish with human flesh. One reason 
 for this terrible practice was that he was unfortunate 
 with his slaves. When they were waiting on his table 
 they were careless or clumsy, breaking dishes, or up- 
 setting decanters and other tableware. If a servant of 
 Pollio was so unfortunate as to break a valuable piece 
 of glass or crockery, he would have to pay the pen- 
 
134 LIVING CREATURES, 
 
 alty, then and there, by being thrown into the fish- 
 pond. This was the order: 
 
 Whoever breaks the glass or dishes, 
 That man becomes the food of fishes. 
 
 Well, on one occasion the Emperor Augustus came 
 to sup with Pollio, when he was, of course, richly en- 
 tertained. The best dishes, the finest vases, the best 
 wine appeared on the table. As might be expected 
 in the presence of an emperor, the servants behaved 
 with propriety, and no accident at first happened. 
 
 The fish went off swimmingly, and so did the rest 
 of the dinner; but not so the dessert. An unlucky 
 servant made a slip and broke a crystal goblet ; where- 
 upon his master ordered the offender to be at once de- 
 livered over to the pet murries, in the very presence 
 of the emperor. 
 
 The man knew his doom; so he fell at Augustus' 
 feet and begged him to intercede in his behalf with 
 his master. He did not fear to die it was not al- 
 together that ; but he thought it hard that a man, 
 though a slave, should be gobbled up or nibbled to 
 pieces by fish. 
 
 But Pollio would not listen even to the emperor; 
 whereupon Augustus very properly took the matter 
 into his own hands. He pardoned the slave and set 
 him at liberty ; ordered all Pollio's glass and china to 
 be smashed, and his fish ponds to be filled up. I 
 suppose the emperor made it up with Pollio soon 
 after this affair. At any rate, it is stated that when 
 Pollio died, he left a large part of his property to 
 Augustus, . 
 
135 
 
 3O. " I GO A FISHING. 
 
 So said Simon Peter. And the seven other disciples 
 said, "We also go with thee." Some of these disci- 
 ples, when Jesus first met them, had been fishing, and 
 were then mending their nets. They left their nets and 
 boats to follow him, but it seems that they occasionally 
 repaired to the Sea of Galilee to go a fishing, for the 
 purpose of getting necessary food and for recreation 
 or sport. 
 
 If the fish in this sea were of the same varieties that 
 abound there now, we may know something about 
 those which Simon Peter and his friends caught. Dr. 
 Tristam, visiting Palestine in 1863, collected from the 
 Sea of Galilee fifteen species of fishes. One kind was 
 nearly like our bream or shiner, only much larger. 
 Other species resembled the cat-fish in having barbels 
 hanging from a large snout, but differed from the cat- 
 fish in being clothed with large scales. Another was a 
 species of eel, without scales, and of a black color. 
 
 The fish of the Sea of Galilee are now, as they were 
 eighteen hundred years ago, exceedingly abundant. 
 In ancient times they were caught with a net ; probably 
 never with a hook. Dr. Tristam witnessed the present 
 method of taking them. "An old Arab sat on a long 
 cliff and threw poisoned bread crumbs as far as he could 
 reach; which the fish seized, and turning over dead, 
 were washed ashore and collected for market." 
 
 The shoals presented a marvelous sight, for many hun- 
 dred yards black with the masses of fish, the back fins 
 projecting out of the water as thickly as they could be 
 
136 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 crowded. It is no wonder, then, that in ancient times 
 the net broke on account of the multitude of fishes. 
 When the net was drawn ashore, the fish were sorted. 
 They gathered the good into vessels, but cast the bad 
 away. We know pretty well what the "bad" were; 
 they were the eel-like fish, which were forbidden by 
 the Jewish law to be used as food, because they had 
 no scales. (Lev. xi:io). 
 
 It is likely that the hook is older than the net. 
 There are evidences that savages, long before history 
 was written, used fish-hooks made from the bones of 
 animals, and even from the jaw-bone of the human 
 head. From the remote ages until now, the spear has 
 been used in clear waters for killing fish. The ancient 
 Egyptians made hooks of bronze, and our Saxon an- 
 cestors made hooks from flints. The ancient Scythians 
 practiced a droll method of catching the great cat-fish 
 in the river Danube. The fisherman drove a pair of 
 oxen to a convenient point on the river bank and set 
 them at feeding. 
 
 He laid the yoke down near the edge of the water, 
 fastening a rope to it. To the other end of the rope a 
 strong hook was attached, baited with liver and weight- 
 ed with a sufficiently heavy sinker. The hook was 
 then cast into the. middle of the stream. By and by a 
 huge fish finds the bull's meat, which he dearly loves, 
 opens his immense jaws, swallows the morsel and starts 
 off on his course as many another poor glutton of a 
 fish has done. 
 
 The fisherman observes this performance with de- 
 light; jumps to his feet; yokes his oxen, and then 
 there is a great contest between the strength of two 
 
I GO A FISHING. 
 
 137 
 
 oxen and one immensely powerful fish. The oxen, of 
 course, prevail, and the monster is drawn ashore. 
 
 In these days, the fisherman is assisted by a multi- 
 tude of devices. From the net or the seine to the pin- 
 hook of the child, there are hooks of all sizes and pat- 
 
 Speckled Trout. 
 
 terns ; lines of linen and lines of silk; no end of snells, 
 bobs, flies, and jugs for cat-fishing; poles of bamboo 
 and costly woods, reels and scoop-nets. Game fish 
 are taken with worms, minnows, and flies natural and 
 artificial'. But successful fishing is in the skill of the 
 fisher as much as in the fine tackle he uses. To catch 
 
138 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 a brook-trout is "to cast a fly gracefully, so that it will 
 fall in the right place like a snow-flake or a winged in- 
 sect," and when he is hooked, to land him. 
 
 Says the good Isaak Walton, " God never did make 
 a more calm, quiet, innocent recreation than angling." 
 We all need, like Simon Peter, to go a fishing old 
 and young, girls and boys. Another ' ' brother of the 
 angle " says, ' ' Sometimes the parents take the children 
 a fishing. Whenever they do, they should supply 
 them with a light bamboo rod, and attach at a joint 
 one third from the top end a fine silk or linen line; 
 then affix a float according to the depth of the water, 
 so that the bait will sink within six inches of the bot- 
 tom, and a foot above the hook fasten to the line from 
 one to three split shot. 
 
 "Let the hook be of the minnow size, and let the 
 bait, dug the day previous and laid in moss or grass 
 over night, merely cover the point of the hook. Never 
 bait with the head of a worm ; always break that off 
 and throw it in the water." 
 
 " I love to see the man of care 
 
 Take pleasure in a toy ; 
 I love to see him row or ride, 
 
 And tread the grass with joy, 
 Or throw the circling salmon fly 
 . As lusty as a boy. 
 
 " The road of life is hard enough, 
 
 Bestrewn with slag and thorn ; 
 I would not mock the simplest joy 
 
 That makes it less forlorn, 
 But fill its evening path with flowers 
 
 As fresh as those of morn." 
 
ANOTHER VIEW OF FISHING. 
 
 139 
 
 31. ANOTHER VIEW OF FISHING. 
 
 THERE are some people who conscientiously think 
 that fishing is a cruel amusement. While we should 
 never, needlessly, inflict pain upon any living creature, 
 it is well to reflect that the world of fish is any thing 
 but a paradise of peace. It is a scene of constant 
 war and fighting. Fish have no sympathy or tender- 
 ness. Big fish eat little fish when they can catch 
 them. Great fish enter into combats, one with an- 
 
 Black Bass. 
 
 other, like fierce tigers. Even pet fish in the aqua- 
 rium occasionally turn on their companions and de- 
 vour them. 
 
 It is well, also, to know that all cold-blooded ani- 
 mals have no very keen sense of pain, and that the 
 water-breathing fish, jerked into the air, dies by air- 
 drowning as easily as an air-breathing animal dies by 
 water-drowning. There are some who think fishing 
 an idle and foolish amusement. Such .will take com- 
 fort from Dr. Samuel Johnson, a distinguished English 
 
I4O LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 writer of a .hundred years ago, who describes fishing 
 as ' ' a stick and a string with a fool at one end and a 
 worm at the other. " For the comfort of such the 
 verses of Dr. Walcott may be quoted, who thus ad- 
 dresses the innocent fish, without hooking him : 
 
 " O harmless tenant of the flood, 
 I do not wish to spill thy blood ; 
 
 For nature unto thee 
 Perchance has given a tender wife, 
 And children dear, to charm thy life, 
 
 As she hath done to me. 
 
 "Enjoy thy stream, O harmless fish, 
 And when an angler, for his dish, 
 
 Through gluttony's vile sin 
 Attempts a wretch to pull thee o^tt, 
 God give thee strength, O gentle trout, 
 
 To pull the rascal in!" 
 
 32. TOADS AND FROGS. 
 
 THE toad, named Bufo, is a droll, humorous, wag- 
 gish fellow. He has no visible means of defense. 
 He can not bite, for he has no teeth. He can not 
 scratch, for he has no claws. Yet he comes out at 
 night-fall, and looks you in the eye as if he were con- 
 scious of his safety. It is observed that neither the 
 cat nor the dog will touch him. This is because from 
 some glands behind his head, he sends forth a fluid 
 which is biting and offensive, though not poisonous. 
 
 There is a real sense of fun in Bufo. He will play 
 
TOADS AND FROGS. 
 
 141 
 
 Common Toad. 
 
 with sticks, throwing them about. He snaps in fire- 
 flies with his darting tongue, and he has been known 
 to appropriate lighted matches in the same way. He 
 fills himself with stinging bees, and seems to regard 
 the performance with great satisfaction. He has been 
 tamed, and taught to come at the call of his name. 
 A toad was once kept as a pet for thirty-six years, 
 and knew all his friends. 
 
 Some slight differences are noted between Bufo and 
 his cousin Rana, the bull-frog. Bufo is covered with 
 warts, Rana has a* smooth skin ; he also has teeth on 
 his upper jaw. Each has four fingers in front and five 
 toes behind. The tongue in both is fastened at the 
 front of the jaw, and is free behind ; so that it can roll 
 
142 
 
 LIVING CREATURES, 
 
 Tree-toad. 
 
 out and catch an insect by the aid of a sticky gum 
 which it carries, and then turn back with its prize, so 
 
 quickly as scarcely to 
 be seen. 
 
 Of frogs, the tree- 
 frog, the pond-frog, 
 and the bull-frog are 
 most familiar. The lit- 
 tle tree-frog, or tree- 
 toad, is hard to find, 
 because his color is so 
 much like the bark and 
 foliage of the tree. His 
 toes are remarkable. 
 They end in cups or 
 suckers, by which the little climber is able to cleave 
 to the tree. Tree-toads are good weather prophets, 
 and in Germany are sometimes used for barometers. 
 
 This instrument is, mainly, a glass tube, in which 
 mercury rises and falls according to the pressure of 
 the atmosphere. In a similar way a long or high bot- 
 tle is furnished with a very small ladder. Tree-toad 
 is put in the bottle, and climbs up or down the ladder 
 according to the pressure of the atmosphere. 
 
 The bull-frog lives in quiet waters 'where, in early 
 summer, he tunes his instrument a violoncello, per- 
 haps. You may hear him snapping the strings, and 
 then rolling out his roaring bass notes. Some people 
 detect in his notes the words, " Bloody thunder ! bloody 
 thunder ! " The hind legs of Rana are regarded as 
 very delicate food. 
 
 Toads and frogs, when stripped of skin and flesh, 
 
TOADS AND FROGS. 
 
 143 
 
 show a skeleton much like ours. But they have no 
 ribs. Our ribs act in such a way as to fill our lungs, 
 and enable us to breathe. Frogs and toads breathe 
 in a different manner. They take a mouthful of air, 
 then close the mouth and nostrils, and swallow the 
 air. They breathe partly through the skin. The way 
 to smother a man is to stop his mouth and nose. The 
 
 Bull-frog. 
 
 way to smother a frog is to keep his mouth and nose 
 open. A frog, though, has been known to live forty 
 days by breathing through his skin, after his lungs had 
 been taken out. 
 
 What a marvelous nursery and cradle is the water 
 in which are born and reared so many tender things, 
 some of which never again return to this home of 
 their babyhood, when once set free in the air or on 
 
144 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 the ground ! Here the toads and frogs pass through 
 some wonderful changes from the egg to the complete 
 form. These changes are easily seen and watched in 
 the aquarium. 
 
 The eggs, or spawn, are laid in a kind of jelly, which 
 fastens them to a stick or plant in or very near the 
 water (i). After about a month the eggs hatch, when 
 
 Fig. 12. Eggs, Tadpoles, and Frogs. 
 
 there appear very small tadpoles, with head and tail, 
 and a pair of holders behind the mouth (2). Outside 
 gills grow, and become large, like plumes (3). You 
 remember for what purpose are gills in the clam and 
 oyster. Then the gills disappear (4 back view 5). 
 Hind legs put forth (6). Fore legs follow (7). As the 
 legs grow, the tail shrinks away (8). The tail goes, 
 and the perfect little frog comes (9). 
 
 All this time changes have been going on within the 
 tadpole. When the outside gills passed away, inside 
 
SNAKES. 145 
 
 gills, like those of the fish, came. As these disap- 
 peared, lungs took their place. When all the changes 
 are accomplished, the little frogs are ready, with the 
 first warm rain, to start out and try the land. Some- 
 times they hop a long distance from their watery nurs- 
 ery, and people who know nothing of their history, 
 think they have rained down. 
 
 During winter, frogs lie buried in the mud-bottom 
 of a pond. Toads hide themselves in similar places, 
 or under stones. All have musical voices, which re- 
 peated attention will enable one to distinguish, so as to 
 tell which is that of the toad, which is the frog's, and 
 which is the tree-toad's. The bull-frog's double bass 
 no one can mistake. At the close of winter and frost, 
 the trilling notes from the ponds are a pleasant an- 
 nouncement of spring. 
 
 33. SNAKES, 
 
 THE dread of snakes is common to many animals, 
 to monkeys and to human beings. Children, and 
 monkeys raised in cages, on the first sight of snakes 
 shrink from them with terror. Pigs do not mind them. 
 This dread comes partly from ignorance about snakes, 
 and partly from the fact that some snakes inflict a 
 deadly wound. Pigs are not injured by poisonous 
 reptiles. 
 
 If we knew more about these creatures they would 
 not excite our fears so much. Some people are almost 
 
 L. C. 10. 
 
146 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 as badly frightened by mice and beetles, as by snakes. 
 One peculiarity of these creepers, which makes them 
 dreadful, is that they move so obscurely and silently in 
 the grass. Then they are cold-blooded like toads, and 
 the touch of them is not agreeable. On the other 
 hand, snakes are useful, as their bill of fare shows, and 
 they are truly beautiful. The scaly, many-colored, and 
 
 Rattlesnake. 
 
 glistening skin of some of them is as handsome as the 
 feathered garb of beautiful birds. 
 
 The movements of snakes are graceful. The back- 
 bone of some snakes is composed of more than three 
 hundred parts ; and to each of these parts is attached a 
 pair of ribs. How quickly and easily it turns and coils 
 
SNAKES. 147 
 
 its supple body ! How mighty is the coil of the python 
 that will kill a deer ! 
 
 The snake has no feet, as feet are commonly under- 
 stood. It moves by its backbone and by its ribs. On 
 the under side of the body are scales, one of which is 
 joined to each pair of ribs. The pairs of ribs move 
 forward and backward, and the scales attached to them 
 catch on the rough ground with each motion. This 
 operation gives the animal its gliding gait. The snake 
 is adapted to swimming, and to climbing trees, but it 
 would make bad work trying to crawl on glass. 
 
 The bones in the head of the snake are joined by 
 elastic ligaments, so that it is able to swallow animals 
 much larger than its head appears to be. Snakes 
 never chew their food, but swallow it whole. Their 
 eyes have no eyelids. Their hearing is dull. All 
 snakes are as "deaf as an adder." The forked tongue 
 is the feeler nothing else. There is no harm in it. 
 The teeth are simply for holding the prey; not for 
 chewing. There is no poison in them, and their bite 
 is harmless. 
 
 In temperate climates, snakes lie torpid during the 
 winter. When active, they, like all other animals, are 
 seeking for food. The common ones are after insects, 
 frogs, mice, rabbits, fish, and birds. They have no 
 power to charm animals. Snakes either catch their 
 prey and immediately swallow it, or they wind their 
 coils about it, as do black-snakes and boa-constrictors; 
 or they thrust poison fangs into it, and thus cause its 
 death. No snake, not even the python or the boa, 
 seeks human flesh for food. Neither threaten nor harm 
 a snake, and, as a rule, it will let you alone. 
 
148 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 In our country there are three, and only three kinds 
 of snakes that inflict injury on human beings. These 
 are the snakes that have poisonous fangs. The fangs 
 are entirely distinct from the small holding-teeth. They 
 turn back upon the upper jaw, when not in use ; and 
 are thrust forward, when the snake is about to strike. 
 A sac at the root of the fang contains the poison. 
 
 Copperhead. 
 
 which is sent down a groove or canal in the fang and 
 thrown into the wound, at the will of the snake. 
 Poisonous serpents sometimes bite without using the 
 poison. 
 
 The three kinds of venomous snakes are the rattle- 
 snake, the copperhead, and the water-moccasin of the 
 South. These have the poison fangs. No others have 
 
SNAKES. 149 
 
 them. You may handle grass snakes, milk snakes, 
 spreading adders and racers, and none of them can do 
 you serious harm. The bite of most of them is scarcely 
 more than the prick of a pin-point. 
 
 In some Northern and Southern states the rattlesnake 
 is black, and is called massasauga. Elsewhere it is usu- 
 
 Moccasin. 
 
 ally more or less distinctly spotted. In the Southern 
 States it is adorned by diamond-shaped spots, and is 
 called the diamond rattler. The Oregon rattlesnake has 
 round spots ; while that of many states is called the 
 banded rattlesnake. 
 
 The number of rattles on the tail indicates nothing in 
 regard to the age of the animal. The use of the rattle 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 has been a good deal of a puzzle. The copperhead re- 
 sides in a more southern latitude. It has a dark brown 
 head, and reddish spots on its body. I have several 
 times met it, and have killed it, but never saw it show 
 a very fighting disposition. The water-moccasin is 
 olive brown in color, and is more dreaded than all 
 others, because it is more irritable, and more disposed 
 to attack. 
 
 The young of all serpents are produced from eggs. 
 At regular periods snakes slough, or throw off, their 
 skins, a bright new covering taking the place of the old 
 garment. 
 
 34. HOW A TURTLE TAUGHT A LESSON. 
 
 THE following sketch by Mr. E. S. Thayer appeared 
 some years since in St. Nicholas, and is inserted here 
 by permission. 
 
 About thirty years ago, there was a little boy whose 
 name was John a pretty boy, with thick, golden hair, 
 large, brown eyes, red cheeks, and freckles. One day, 
 in summer, he was playing by the side of a brook in 
 one of the pastures near his home in the country. 
 The brook resembled the boy in some respects. It 
 was in its first light-hearted youth, and went on its 
 way, leaping and sporting. 
 
 This active little boy first built a dam of moss and 
 turf and stones ; then he rolled up his trousers and 
 sailed his little schooner-rigged boat; and, finally, 
 
HOW A TURTLE TAUGHT A LESSON. 15! 
 
 waded aimlessly over the smooth sand through the 
 cool, running water, dashing the sparkling drops to 
 right and left with his frisky feet. In this way, he 
 came to a large, flat rock, over a portion of whose 
 smooth surface the stream flowed in a broad, crystal 
 current. 
 
 A mud-turtle sat on the rock, half out of the water, 
 enjoying the pleasant sunshine, apparently as contented 
 and happy as a turtle could be. But when he "saw the 
 boy splashing along at such a rate, he thought it high 
 time to be gone ; perhaps he had previously had ex- 
 perience of the tender mercies of boys, for he made 
 great haste to reach the protecting mud of the bank. 
 
 "Ah, ha, you rogue! you think you can get away, 
 do you?" shouted the youngster. The next instant 
 he was kneeling on the slippery rock, with both hands 
 outstretched over the prisoner. John had been carry- 
 ing his shoes his stockings stuffed into them with 
 one hand ; but now, in his eagerness to secure the turtle, 
 he dropped them upon a part of the rock covered by 
 the stream, and, turning sideways as they fell, the 
 water rushed in, filling them to the very toes. . 
 
 ' 'There!" exclaimed John, half in real and half in 
 affected vexation, ' ' you have made me get my stock- 
 ings wet, and you must be punished for it. I shall 
 turn you over on your back, and you may stay there, 
 sir, until I come back from school to-night." 
 
 That night, John came home from school, with a 
 group of school-fellows, over the village road, instead 
 of across the pasture, forgetting all about the turtle 
 he had left on the rock. Vacation began the next 
 day, and John was to spend a whole month with his 
 
152 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 brother who lived in Boston. You can understand 
 the excitement which attends a boy's preparations for 
 his first journey ; but a country boy's first visit to 
 Boston exceeds, perhaps, any experience of yours in 
 that line. 
 
 The month passed swiftly away, and John returned 
 home with brighter eyes and prouder step. The world 
 had been revealed to him on a broader scale. What 
 had he not seen? He was a hero in the opinion of 
 his school-mates. He had enough stories to tell of 
 his adventures to last through the winter. 
 
 If possible, he was a merrier boy than before, who 
 now bounded through the dear old pasture. There 
 were several dams visited by their young proprietor, 
 one somewhat extensive, with a miniature water-wheel 
 and mill at the side. The dam had been partially 
 washed away by a violent rain, and an accumulation 
 of moss had clogged the wheel of the mill. " Ah! 
 I see there has been a freshet, and my mill is dam- 
 aged. These freshets are terrible things for manufact- 
 urers, I declare ! " 
 
 Leaving the scene of this disaster, he approached 
 the smooth, white rock, which was always a favorite 
 resort, and near which, on the bank of the stream, 
 there was a structure of brick about two feet high, 
 which this young man called "my summer residence 
 on the Hudson." 
 
 Six yards from the rock, he suddenly paused, with 
 his eyes intently fixed upon some object before him. 
 'Step by step, he drew nearer without once moving his 
 eyes, which were now full of horror mingled with a 
 hopeful doubt; but as he proceeded, the doubt van- 
 
HOW A TURTLE TAUGHT A LESSON. 
 
 153 
 
 
 John and the Mud-turtle. 
 
 ished, and the horror spread over his whole counte- 
 nance. There lay the turtle on the rock, upon its 
 back, as he had left it its extended legs and head 
 shriveled and dry, scorched by the blazing suns of 
 four August weeks. 
 
 There was no need of gentle pity now no oppor- 
 tunity for showing humane kindness to a dumb, harm- 
 less creature. No more would it gladly hide itself in 
 the protecting earth, or hasten in fright from the 
 dreaded hand. What vain struggles to regain its feet ! 
 What weariness and despair ! What agony when the 
 noon suns beat down ! What pangs of slow starva- 
 tion ! As all this passed through John's mind, the 
 rock seemed no longer the old, familiar spot. 
 
154 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 With pallid face he turned away, and hurried home 
 in the gathered twilight, nor stopped until he reached 
 the cheerful room in which his mother sat sewing and 
 his father reading. 
 
 That boy has long been a man, but the years that 
 have passed have by no means worn away the remem- 
 brance of this scene, or the impressions it left on his 
 mind. And on that memorable evening John took 
 his first lesson in kindness toward dumb animals. 
 
 35. THE BOX-TORTOISE AND ITS KIN. 
 
 THE tortoise, or turtle, is appropriately called "an 
 animal in a box." It is an animal with a backbone; 
 and a most singular specimen of the backboned or 
 vertebrate animals it is. Insects, as we saw, have 
 their skeletons on the outside, and their soft parts 
 flesh and so forth inside. The backboned animal, in 
 nearly all cases, has its skeleton of bone within, and 
 its soft parts without. But here is an animal that has 
 a bony skeleton both inside and outside. 
 
 The inside bones of the turtle grow through the 
 flesh and spread over the body above and below, mak- 
 ing a box with holes for the head and the legs to pass 
 out and in. This shell is covered with horny plates, 
 which, when taken from a particular kind of sea-turtle, 
 are the tortoise-shell of which combs and match-boxes 
 
THE BOX-TORTOISE AND ITS KIN. 
 
 155 
 
 are made. The head is covered with horny substance 
 to protect it. The jaws are hard and are without teeth. 
 The shell-box is so stiff that the turtle can not breathe 
 in the ordinary way. Hence it breathes like the toad, 
 by swallowing the air. The food of the box-tortoise 
 consists of insects, of toad-stools and mushrooms. 
 
 The main difference between the land and the water 
 turtles is that the former has stubby feet, while the 
 latter has webbed or 
 finny feet for swim- 
 ming. Our common 
 turtle likes to live 
 both on land and in 
 the water. There is 
 a kind of box-tor- 
 toise which despises 
 the water, exists 
 wholly on land, and 
 
 sometimes lives to a great age. The Rev. Gilbert 
 White, of England, owned one that had lived among 
 his friends for forty years. A turtle was found in 
 Pennsylvania bearing a date which was known to have 
 been cut in its shell before the commencement of this 
 century ; and when last found it was more than sixty 
 years old. 
 
 The sea-turtles, which are especially abundant about 
 the Tortugas Islands, are those commonly used for 
 food. The green turtle is preferred for this purpose. 
 Some of. these sea-turtles grow to an immense size, a 
 single one weighing as much as four hundred and fifty 
 pounds. The manner of depositing eggs on the sand 
 beach of the islands is thus described by Audubon; 
 
 Box- tortoise. 
 
156 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 "On first nearing the shore, and mostly on fine, calm 
 moonlight nights, the turtle raises her head above the 
 water, looks around her, and attentively examines the 
 objects on the shore. Should she see nothing likely to 
 disturb her intended operations, she gives a loud hiss- 
 
 Green-turtle. 
 
 ing sound by which her enemies are startled and driven 
 away. She advances slowly toward the beach, crawls 
 over it, her head raised to the full length of her neck, 
 and when she reaches a suitable place, she gazes all 
 around in silence. 
 
 "Then she proceeds to make a hole in the sand with 
 her hind flippers. The sand is raised with one flipper 
 and then with the other, as with a ladle, until it is 
 piled up behind her. In this manner the hole is dug 
 to the depth of two feet. This labor I have seen per- 
 formed in the short space of nine minutes. 
 
UNIVERSITY 
 LIZARDS AND CROCODILES. 
 
 "The eggs are then dropped, one by one, and ar- 
 ranged in regular layers to the number of a hundred 
 and fifty or two hundred. The whole time spent in this 
 part of the operation may be about twenty minutes. 
 She now scrapes the loose sand back over the eggs, 
 and so levels them and smoothes the surface, that 
 few persons, on seeing the spot, could imagine that 
 any thing had been done to it. This accomplished to 
 her mind, she retreats to the water with all possible 
 speed, leaving the hatching of the eggs to the heat of 
 the sand." 
 
 36. LIZARDS AND CROCODILES. 
 
 THE eye will readily detect the difference between 
 the two reptiles, the serpent and the lizard. As the 
 snake has a more perfect body skeleton than the toad, 
 so the lizard is more complete than the snake, and, be- 
 sides, has four limbs. The limbs are weak, and the 
 lizard shows its cousinship to the snake by touching 
 the under part of its body to the ground. 
 
 Like snakes, lizards have been the subjects of a great 
 many notions, stories and superstitions that are entirely 
 without foundation. Many stories have been told 
 about the basilisk of South America and Mexico. It 
 was said that it possessed a deadly poison with which 
 it infected the air ; and that the glance of its eye 
 carried destruction. The fact is that the basilisk is 
 entirely harmless and inoffensive. The lizard called the 
 gila monster, of Arizona, gives poison in its bite ; but 
 
158 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 nearly all lizards are wholly inoffensive, while they do 
 much good by destroying beetles and other harmful 
 insects. 
 
 The horned toad, which is found in some of the states 
 west of the Mississippi, in Colorado and California, 
 
 is coming to be well 
 known, because it is 
 so pleasing as a pet. 
 It is not a toad, 
 though slightly re- 
 sembling one. When 
 first caught, a string 
 is tied to its horns, 
 and it is fastened like 
 a chained dog. Soon 
 it becomes very tame, 
 and will take milk 
 
 and flies from the hands of its friends. It is so bashful 
 that, when looked at sharply, it flattens its body and 
 pretends to be dead. A little tickling of its sides 
 brings back its activity. The dog it especially dislikes, 
 puffing itself up when he comes near, and lowering its 
 horns and hissing in a most ridiculous way. 
 
 A long step from the lizard brings us to the crocodile 
 and alligator, which inhabit tropical rivers. The croco- 
 dile sometimes grows to a length of twenty fe.et. In 
 Africa it is very abundant, and is dangerous, sometimes 
 catching cattle and antelopes, when they come to drink. 
 Livingstone says it frequently captures little children 
 at play on the river banks. 
 
 The ancient Greek historian, Herodotus, describes 
 the crocodile bird, which is a cousin of our plover. 
 
 Horned Toad. 
 
LIZARDS AND CROCODILES. 
 
 159 
 
 He says that the inside of the mouth of the huge rep- 
 tile is covered with leeches; and that while all other 
 birds avoid the crocodile, the trochilus (tro'kilus) lives 
 at peace with it. When the animal lies on the beach, 
 it opens its mouth wide to let in the' fresh breeze. 
 Then its little feathered friend enters the mouth and 
 picks out the leeches, thus doing great service to the 
 monster. Recent travelers have found this story of 
 Herodotus to be true. The plover has been seen to 
 
 Alligator. 
 
 walk up and down the back of the crocodile, and to 
 enter its mouth. But when the hunter appears, the 
 bird screeches and wakes up the sleeping beast, when 
 it darts into the water and is safe. 
 
 The alligator of Florida is the American crocodile. 
 Its young are sometimes petted, and its skin is made 
 use of for leather. Its greatest length is twelve feet. 
 It "does not attack like the African crocodile. Dog 
 meat is especially relished by it, and alligators are said 
 to assemble on hearing the whining of a puppy. Like 
 other reptiles of their kind, crocodiles and alligators 
 lay eggs, which are left in the sand to hatch. 
 
I6O LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 37. AUBUBON. 
 
 AUDUBON (O'du bon) was a great friend of birds 
 you may have* learned that. But do you know that 
 he was one of the great toilers who endured hardship 
 and danger to find out, and to put into convenient 
 form our knowledge of birds ? One little incident in 
 his life will show how much such knowledge costs. 
 
 In the forests of Florida, Audubon discovered a 
 small gray bird, in color so nearly like the trees upon 
 which it was busy that it was almost impossible to see 
 it distinctly. He could not rest until he had found 
 out about it. He, therefore, procured a field-glass or 
 telescope, made a bed of moss in a concealed place, 
 and there lay most of the time for three weeks, watch- 
 ing the movements and ways of a pair of these little 
 gray birds. By this painstaking he was able to write 
 their history. 
 
 For fifteen years he roamed through the forests and 
 over the wild plains of America, with gun, knapsack, 
 and dog. He visited the homes of wild birds from 
 Florida to Labrador, and from the Atlantic to the 
 wilds of the Missouri River. He was exposed to all 
 weathers and climates ; to heat, cold, and storm. He 
 not only studied the habits of birds, but with his 
 pencil he drew their forms, and with his brush he 
 painted their natural colors. Then he published to the 
 world two volumes, of elephant folio size (twenty- 
 three by fourteen inches) containing the written his- 
 tory and the colored portraits of over a thousand 
 birds of America. 
 
AUDUBON. l6l 
 
 To secure a publisher for this immense book he 
 must go to Europe. He landed in England with only 
 one sovereign in his pocket, and without friends or ac- 
 quaintance. Within two years, in 1828, he had won 
 for his work the hearty interest of the kings of England 
 and France, and had made friends of such great men 
 as Sir Walter Scott and Baron Cuvier (CiiVea) the 
 great naturalist of France. 
 
 By making pictures of animals and selling them, as 
 he said, "at a price scarcely more than the wages of 
 a common laborer," he paid his ordinary expenses. 
 All this time he was inducing men of wealth to sub- 
 scribe for the book he was trying to publish, at one 
 thousand dollars a copy. Of these subscribers he ob- 
 tained a hundred and seventy, and completed his great 
 undertaking within five years. 
 
 It may be interesting to know what sort of a boy 
 grew into such a man. John James Audubon (which 
 was his full name) was born in 1780 in Louisiana, and 
 died in New York in 1851. He was not poor as were 
 some of the boys who became great men. His father 
 was a Frenchman, who had gained wealth in St. Do- 
 mingo and in Louisiana ; and his life began under or- 
 ange-trees, among flowers, and in hearing of the wild 
 mocking-bird's song. 
 
 His youth was spent at his father's country home 
 in France, where, by a kind step-mother, he was in- 
 dulged in all that a boy could wish. He pursued the 
 ordinary school branches, and by the famous artist 
 David was taught to draw and to paint. He learned 
 to play the flute and the violin, and became an ac- 
 complished dancer. What a singular preparation for 
 
 L. C. xx. 
 
1 62 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 John James Audubon. 
 
 a life that must be spent in the camp, in swamps, and 
 woods, and that must be supported on wild fowl, 
 roots, and herbs. 
 
 Arrived at young manhood, with plenty of gold, he 
 came to this country and lived by himself on a beauti- 
 ful farm in Pennsylvania, which his father had previ- 
 
AUDUBON. 163 
 
 ously purchased. Here he was gay, and fond of dress. 
 He even hunted in satin breeches and low pump shoes. 
 As during his childhood in France, so now when he 
 was grown, he was always trying to gratify his passion 
 for birds. He had a fondness for all animals, and was 
 skillful in training dogs. 
 
 But poverty came to him at last. Through the 
 carelessness and failure of agents, his property was 
 lost. Having married, he removed to Kentucky, where 
 he tried to be a merchant, but failed. He then made 
 his home in Louisiana. His early sports in hunting 
 and fishing had helped to give him a good physical 
 constitution. His polite training fitted him for winning 
 the friendship of all sorts of people. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 A SINGLE anecdote will give something of Audu- 
 bon's earlier experiences. He had to cross the wild 
 prairie in southern Illinois alone, except for the presence 
 of his dog who was his constant companion. When 
 night came, the distant howling of the wolves encour- 
 aged him to hope that he was near the wooded coun- 
 try where a camp-fire might be enjoyed. Soon a light 
 gleamed ahead, and a log cabin was at length reached. 
 Here a tall, haggard woman appeared, who consented 
 to allow the traveler to lodge in the cabin. By the 
 fire within sat a young Indian who refused to talk. 
 
 Having supped on venison and fed his dog, Audu- 
 bon took out his gold watch and remarked to the 
 woman that, as it was late, he would like to retire. 
 She cast a longing look upon the treasure, and Audu- 
 
164 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 bon, to gratify her, allowed her to take the watch and 
 to put its chain about her neck. She was greatly 
 pleased, and declared she would be the happiest woman 
 if she owned such a treasure. 
 
 This aroused Audubon's suspicion. Then the Indian 
 passed by him and gave him a severe pinch in his side. 
 He now studied both the woman and the red man, 
 but concluded that of the two the latter was his friend. 
 After a while, for the purpose of wjnding it, he asked 
 the woman for his watch. Taking his gun, he said he 
 would go out and see what the weather promised. 
 Once outside the cabin, he slipped a bullet into his 
 rifle, scraped the flint of its lock, and primed it with 
 powder. 
 
 Re-entering the cabin, he lay down on some bear- 
 skins in the corner, with his faithful dog by his side, 
 and soon pretended to be sound asleep. Shortly, two 
 strong young men entered, bringing the carcass of a 
 deer. They asked the mother why that rascally Indian 
 was there, when she hushed them, pointed to Audu- 
 bon in the corner, and softly spoke of the watch. All 
 this, in the glare of the firelight, the stranger could see 
 with his half-open eyes. He touched his dog, who 
 looked up and seemed to understand what was going 
 on, as if he were human. 
 
 When the young men had eaten their supper, the 
 three drank a quantity of whisky, and the woman, 
 like a grim fiend, taking a large carving-knife, went to 
 the grindstone to whet its edge. Audubon saw her 
 pour the water on the stone and turn the crank. It 
 seemed to him that his life was in great danger, and a 
 cold sweat started over his whole frame. Having made 
 
AMONG THE BIRDS. 165 
 
 the weapon sharp, she returned to her sons and said, 
 " There, that'll settle him ! And then for the watch ! " 
 Audubon silently touched his dog, cocked his rifle, 
 and was ready to shoot the person who first attempted his 
 life. He had almost risen to fire at the woman, when 
 the door burst open and two stout travelers entered. 
 Audubon sprang to his feet, and the Indian bounded 
 up and danced for joy ; for he, like Audubon, had lain 
 in fear of his life. The whole story was soon told, 
 when the woman and her sons were bound, and the 
 next day were carried away and punished. 
 
 38. AMONG THE BIRDS. 
 
 WITH a group of wild mallard ducks in view, we be- 
 gin to learn something about birds. Do you expect a 
 definition of a bird? Let me the rather ask you the 
 question, What is a bird ? and leave you to answer it. 
 I think I hear some bright girl saying, ' ' A bird is an 
 animal that flies." Is it, indeed? Is a bat a bird, and 
 are there no birds that do not fly? What about the 
 ostrich, and the penguin which has no feathered wings 
 to fly with? 
 
 Another suggests something about feathers. Ah ! 
 that springs a thought in the right direction. Now run 
 over in your mind all the different kinds of animals 
 you can think of, and see whether any of them besides 
 birds have feathers. It would be well to get some 
 feathers a wing, for example and examine them 
 
166 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 closely, placing a barb of the vein under a microscope, 
 if possible. 
 
 Procure the bones of a bird that ought to be easily 
 done and see how the frame of the creature is built, 
 and how the different parts suit the habits and pur- 
 poses of the bird's life. The foot is an interesting 
 piece of mechanism. Have you never found, at the 
 joint where the foot and the "drumstick" meet, a 
 tendon or cord which, by being pulled, will draw the 
 claws in ? 
 
 Mallard Duck. 
 
 You can find it in the chicken's foot ; see if it is also 
 in the duck's foot. And now give a reason, if you 
 can, why, when a chicken holds to its roost all night, 
 its foot does not grow tired. If the same arrangement 
 should be found in the duck's foot, of what use would 
 it be, since the duck does not perch? You would find 
 your hand very tired were you compelled to grasp a 
 pole for eight hours without rest. 
 
AMONG THE BIRDS. 167 
 
 For the purpose of learning something about their 
 general ways and habits, birds may be divided into 
 three large groups : birds of the water, birds of the 
 land, and birds of the air. One thing, however, must 
 be kept in mind, and that is, that a bird has a definite 
 object to live for. This object is threefold ; namely, 
 to secure and to eat its food; to protect its young; and 
 to escape from danger. 
 
 The duck is certainly a water bird. It can fly, but 
 it can not easily perch, nor can it scratch like a chick- 
 en. It is made to get its food, to rear its young, and 
 to escape from danger in or about the water. The 
 duck's body, you will see, is shaped like the keel of a 
 well-made boat. Compare the wish-bone or merry- 
 thought of a duck with that of a chicken, and see how 
 much better the duck's keel is suited to sailing. Then 
 compare the feet of the two, and decide which foot is 
 the best paddle. The chicken's foot has scarcely any 
 web connecting the toes; the duck's foot has a web 
 extending to the ends of the three front toes. 
 
 You have noticed, I suppose, that the duck has a 
 ludicrous walk. Some very fat 
 people walk in the same way. 
 Watch a race between chickens 
 and ducks when all are called to 
 be fed. How soon the ducks are 
 
 left behind. Then watch a hen 
 
 while the ducklings she has hatched sail on the water 
 they so happy, and she so miserable. Then the hen is 
 left behind. It is not difficult to decide which one 
 belongs to the water and which one to the land. 
 The duck's feet are wide apart, and its legs are joined 
 
1 68 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 to the body far back toward the tail, like the paddle- 
 wheels of a steamboat. The duck's food is largely in 
 the shallow, muddy bottom. Its bill is rather flat and 
 broad, and on the inside is furnished with plates like 
 strainers, by which the food is retained, and the mud 
 and water are strained out, and run away. 
 
 The duck finds in the water a protection from dan- 
 ger both for itself and for its young. It can swim 
 swiftly away from enemies that might catch it on shore, 
 and when surprised by the sportsman, it can dive and 
 move for some distance under the surface. The duck- 
 lings are covered with down, and can swim and dive as 
 soon as they are hatched, so that they, too, find a com- 
 paratively safe home in the water. 
 
 PART 2. 
 
 THE canvas-back, the mallard, and the fat little teal 
 are the ducks chiefly sought by the sportsman. The 
 tame Rouen duck isjeally a mallard, and the drake 
 may be known by the green head, white ring about 
 the neck, glossy, black back, and silver-gray under- 
 feathers. 
 
 The wild duck is cunning. . It often dives,, and re- 
 mains out of sight, leaving the spectator to wonder 
 where it can. be. But the sportsman has found that, 
 having swum to shallow water, the bird will lie with 
 its bill and nostrils out of water until danger is over. 
 
 The nest of the duck is made under a bush not far 
 from the water. In twenty-eight days the nine or 
 eleven eggs hatch. The mother-bird plucks the feath- 
 ers from her breast, to cover her eggs. From this 
 
AMONG THE BIRDS. 
 
 169 
 
 habit the costly down of the northern eider-duck is 
 left to be gathered. When the young are hatched, 
 the mother hurries them to the water to escape the 
 craft of foxes, minks, and snakes. 
 
 Wild geese and swans are relations of the duck. 
 Both make a great show of defense, the goose by 
 hissing and the swan by whistling. They make their 
 summer nest far north, but travel southward in the 
 autumn. Wild geese are frequently seen flying very 
 high in the air, in two lines coming to a point like a 
 wedge. In this way they cleave the air more easily. 
 Flying in the night, they make a doleful noise so that 
 they may keep together. 
 
 The tame goose is a very ancient member of the 
 poultry-yard, much more so than the tame duck. 
 Homer and other 
 Greek writers speak 
 of it. The Romans 
 kept geese in walled 
 yards, hatched their 
 eggs under hens, and 
 plucked their feathers 
 twice a year. Pliny, 
 greatly distressed at 
 the luxurious habits 
 of his fellow Romans, 
 writes: "Luxury has 
 come to such a pitch 
 that now-a-days men will not rest their necks unless 
 upon a pillow of goose- feathers. " 
 
 Although ducks and their cousins have paddle-feet, 
 they sometimes, to avoid the dangers of the ground, 
 
 Wild Geese. 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 build nests in trees. How the ducklings reach the 
 ground is not known. Of tree-nesting geese, the Rev. 
 Gilbert White, of Selborne, England, who spent forty 
 years in studying animals, says : 
 
 "The geese in Richmond Park do roost on trees 
 and make their nests in old oaks, conveying their 
 young to the ground under their wings. All this be- 
 cause, when they made their nests on the ground, the 
 
 water-rats destroyed 
 their eggs." This be- 
 ing true, it is but just 
 to add that this bird 
 is not half so much of 
 a "goose" as people 
 generally suppose. 
 
 Does the swan ever 
 sing? Pliny says, 
 when about to die the 
 swan retires and sings 
 most sweetly. Ben 
 Jonson called his 
 friend Shakespeare 
 the ' ' sweet swan of 
 King penguin. Avon. " Sharp eyes 
 
 and ears spoil the old fables. The swan never sings. 
 It is worth little except for its beauty. 
 
 The loon, the guillemot, and the penguin are more 
 thoroughly water birds than is the duck. Their bills 
 are differently shaped because their food is fish. The 
 loon, called also the great northern diver, is the prince 
 of all divers. It will dodge a close shot. It is, how- 
 ever, "as stupid as a loon," for a bright-colored flag 
 
WATER-SKIMMERS AND FLYERS. I /I 
 
 floated on the water will so attract its attention that it 
 may forget to dive at the right moment, and then 
 falls a victim of the bullet. It has a long and power- 
 ful wing. 
 
 The loon's legs are set further back than the duck's 
 legs. It is impossible for this bird to stand except in 
 a perpendicular attitude. The penguin of the Ant- 
 arctic seas is more closely confined to the water than 
 the loon. Its wings are without feathers and are used 
 in swimming. It can not fly, and is like the seal 
 among milk-giving animals. 
 
 39. WATER-SKIMMERS AND FLYERS. 
 
 AND a good south wind sprung up behind; 
 
 The albatross did follow, 
 
 And every day, for food or play, 
 
 Came to the mariners' hollo! Coleridge. 
 
 PASSING from the birds that swim, dive, and use the 
 water to live and move in more than the land or the 
 air, we come to those that are so constructed as to 
 hover over the water, or to wade in its shallow edges 
 in quest of fish-food. Those that pick their food from 
 the surface of large waters, are provided with long and 
 strong wings. Those that enter the edge of the water 
 for the same purpose, are fitted with long legs and long 
 necks. The bills of all fish-eating birds are strong 
 and have sharp, cutting edges. 
 
 Among the sea-flyers the albatross is distinguished. 
 
172 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 It weighs about fifteen pounds. When its wings are 
 extended, the distance between the tips of them is 
 eleven feet. The albatross will follow a ship for hun- 
 dreds of miles, to pick up the refuse which may be 
 thrown upon the water. It is furnished with webbed 
 toes so that it may rest and swim on quiet water. 
 " When one of these great birds swoops past the ob- 
 
 Wandering Albatross. 
 
 server, almost within reach of his hand, it is easy to 
 realize the strength which carries him as he cleaves 
 the air on those huge wings. 
 
 "The breeding grounds, both in the Northern and 
 Southern hemispheres, are upon rocky headlands or 
 oceanic islands, and are crowded by countless num- 
 bers of birds. There sit the females or the males, as 
 the case may be, upon the solitary dirty egg placed 
 in a slight hollow in the ground. So close are they, 
 frequently, that it is difficult to walk between them, 
 
WATER -SKIMMERS AND FLYERS. 1/3 
 
 while they take no further notice of the intruder than 
 to pick viciously at his legs. Here, often, on the very 
 spot where this long-winged bird is cradled, a pen- 
 'guin may afterwards bring up a nestling whose wings 
 bear no feathers." 
 
 Gulls of many varieties skim about the sea and the 
 inland lakes. They belong with the birds that have 
 strong flying power, with bills for fishing, and webbed 
 toes for swimming, when it is necessary to sit on the 
 water. Their nests are made in the sand of the beach. 
 There are many varieties of gulls. 
 
 The tern, or sea-swallow, may be counted as one of 
 these. Pearly white, gentle and harmless, with small 
 red legs and webbed toes, it does much to relieve the 
 soberness of the sea-coast. But the ladies' hats have 
 demanded its life. What would old Pliny say if he 
 were here, and should find that forty thousand of these 
 lovely birds were slain in one year, merely to get their 
 wings for ornaments? 
 
 The pelican has full- webbed feet; that is, a web 
 joins all four toes instead of three of them as in the 
 case of the duck. It is found 
 on the Florida coast, and has 
 a bill about a foot long. At- 
 tached to its under jaw, is a 
 pouch which holds a gallon, 
 or perhaps six pounds of fish. Pe iican's root. 
 
 Into this bag the game is re- 
 ceived as soon as it is caught, when the bird retires to a 
 sunny beach and devours the food. There is something 
 here to remind one of the cheek pouches of some monk- 
 eys, and of the stomachs of cud-chewing animals. 
 
1/4 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 4O. WADING BIRDS AND SHORE BIRDS. 
 
 I COME from haunts of coot and hern: 
 
 I make a sudden sally, 
 And sparkle out among the fern 
 
 To bicker down a valley. Tennyson. 
 
 IT is Tennyson's Brook that speaks, and it comes 
 from a wild pond which is the haunt of the coot and 
 the heron. While the reader is learning about the 
 heron, let him learn by heart the whole poem of The 
 Brook. The habits of the different kinds of water-feed- 
 ing birds are leading us to the shallow edges, and will 
 soon carry us entirely away from broad sheets of water. 
 
 The coot is the common 
 little mud-hen of the marshes, 
 and is interesting because of its 
 lobed foot, which has flaps 
 on the sides of the toes. The 
 heron, the stork, and the 
 crane are usually to be seen 
 at the zoological gardens. 
 The stork is a European bird, 
 
 American Coot. 
 
 and in some localities is quite 
 
 domestic. These waders have long necks ; this is be- 
 cause they have long legs. The neck must be long 
 enough to bring the bill back to the ground from which 
 the legs take it away. 
 
 Of the several kinds of heron, the large blue heron 
 is distinguished by its long sharp bill, the plume or 
 crest on its head, and the dull blue color of its upper 
 parts. It wades into the water and stands perfectly 
 
WADING BIRDS AND SHORE BIRDS. 
 
 175 
 
 motionless, while watching for a fish to pass by. In 
 this position it may wait for hours, until the fishes con- 
 clude that the legs are nothing more than a pair of 
 sticks. Then it darts down its bill with perfect aim 
 and lightning speed, and seldom fails to seize its prey. 
 
 The Florida flamingo is a long-legged, snaky-necked 
 wader with a beautiful 
 scarlet plumage. It has 
 a duck's webbed foot 
 which must help it to 
 walk on the water-cov- 
 ered mud where it 
 feeds. The great length 
 of neck enables it to 
 work its bill upside down 
 in the mud. On a slight 
 elevation of earth it 
 builds its nest, and when 
 the female is sitting, she 
 folds her long legs like 
 a carpenter's measuring 
 rule. 
 
 Cranes are either white 
 or brown, and are without 
 
 crest-plumes on their heads. In their wild haunts they 
 are given >to sports and games, and have often been 
 seen jumping and dancing, bowing, and flapping their 
 wings in the most ludicrous manner. The large white 
 whooping crane has in its breast a long windpipe, two 
 and a half feet of which are coiled up, like a French 
 horn, under its breast-bone. This gives it the power 
 of producing a loud whooping sound. 
 
 Great Blue Heron. 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The crane was in favor with the Greeks and Romans 
 because of its yearly visit and its delicate flesh. Thus 
 Homer, the greatest Grecian poet, sings: 
 
 So when inclement winters vex the plain 
 With piercing frosts, or thick descending rain, 
 To warmer seas the cranes embodied fly 
 With noise and order through the mid-way sky. 
 
 Homer, and Aris- 
 totle, a Grecian phi- 
 losopher and natural- 
 ist, both refer to the 
 destruction which the 
 cranes bring to the 
 wheat fields. They 
 describe a race of 
 pygmies, or dwarfs, 
 who inhabited, it was 
 supposed, a part of 
 upper Egypt. Upon 
 the newly-sown wheat 
 fields of these little 
 people, the cranes sud- 
 denly descended from 
 the high air. When 
 the pygmies ran out 
 to drive away the 
 mischief-makers, the cranes gobbled them up and car- 
 ried them off so the story goes. 
 
 Leaving the waders and the water, we find the legs 
 and feet of the birds change. The legs are shorter, 
 and the feet are not fully webbed. Some of them are 
 
 Flamingoes and Nest. 
 
WADING BIRDS AND SHORE BIRDS. 
 
 177 
 
 sensitively as 
 were a finger. 
 
 not at all webbed, while others, like some sandpipers' 
 feet, are half-webbed. The snipe family love the damp 
 cr marshy ground, for into this they thrust their long soft 
 bills that are provid- 
 ed with the sense 
 of feeling. The bill 
 feels for a worm as 
 if it 
 The 
 
 woodcock, now be- 
 coming rare at the 
 East, where it has 
 chiefly lived, is the 
 most interesting of 
 the snipes. 
 
 It has a striking 
 head. Its eye is 
 strangely located, and 
 
 its ear is under the eye. Both old and young are 
 marked so much like the ground and the moss, that it 
 is difficult to discover them. Their brooding habits 
 are quite peculiar. An English sports- 
 man and naturalist says: "From 
 close observation I found that the old 
 woodcock carries her young, even 
 when it is larger than a snipe, not in 
 her claws, but by clasping the little bird between her 
 thighs." 
 
 Where neither snipe nor woodcock abound, shore- 
 walkers may perhaps be seen. The plover and the sand- 
 piper are closely related to the snipe. So is the lap- 
 wing spoken of on page 8. 
 
 L. C. 12. 
 
 White Whooping Crane. 
 
 Half-webbed Foot. 
 
1 78 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The Storks of Delfth. 
 
 41. THE STORK. 
 
 v 
 
 THIS bird is a near relation of the heron, and has 
 long and' slender legs, and a long and rather thick 
 neck. The bill is of the same length as the head, and 
 tapers to a point. 
 
 In the countries where it lives, the stork is cher- 
 ished with the utmost affection. In Holland, the 
 people in the towns and cities place wooden boxes or 
 frames on the tops of the houses or chimneys, to in- 
 duce the storks to settle there. The birds are per- 
 fectly tame, and are thought to bring prosperity to 
 the person who entertains them. 
 
 In the. winter the stork goes away to Egypt or some 
 other warm country, and comes back with the swal- 
 lows. The ancient Egyptians almost worshiped it, 
 and it was one of their sacred birds. The reason why 
 this bird is so much beloved is because it destroys the 
 snakes, and rats, and mice, and other unpleasant creat- 
 
THE STORK. 179 
 
 ures that infest the town. It settles fearlessly upon 
 the chimneys and roofs of the houses, and builds a flat 
 nest of sticks, lined with twigs and straw, and dry 
 grass. There are laid three or four eggs of a bluish- 
 white color, and it takes thirty days to hatch them. 
 
 In Holland and Germany the stork rears her young 
 in the utmost security on the tops of the houses, and 
 even walks about in the most crowded streets amid 
 men, women, and children, without the least danger. 
 To harm a stork is considered an act of barbarity. 
 The young birds come out of the shell, covered with 
 down, and remain in the nest until the end of sum- 
 mer. The parents watch over them with the greatest 
 attention, and feed them by putting food into their 
 mouths from their own beaks. Nothing could ever 
 induce a stork to leave her young ones; she would 
 rather remain and perish with them. 
 
 There was once a great fire in the city of Delfth, 
 Holland. The flames spread to a house on which a 
 mother stork was rearing her young. The little ones 
 were too weak to fly, and their parents did all they 
 could to carry them away. They made many and 
 desperate efforts, but it was all in vain, and the little 
 ones were obliged to remain in the nest. 
 
 Meanwhile the fire came nearer and nearer, and you 
 would think the old storks would be frightened and fly 
 away. But no ; they still refused to leave their little 
 ones, and staid close by them. Even when the 
 flames closed round the nest they did not stir, choos- 
 ing rather to die with their young than desert them. 
 
 After such a touching history, one does not wonder 
 that the stork is respected and beloved. 
 
i8o 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 42. BIRDS OF THE LAND. 
 
 THEY are brought to mind by the crowing of the 
 cock in the yard ; by the cackling of the hen in the 
 hay-loft; by the gabbling of the strutting turkey 
 gobbler; by the brassy clicking of the shy guinea- 
 fowl ; by the shrill, doleful cry of the gorgeous pea- 
 cock, and by the cheerful whistling of Bob White sit- 
 ting on the fence. These birds of the land may fly 
 
 Group of Quail. 
 
 or perch, but the ground is their home. Here they 
 find their food, make their nests, and rear their young. 
 What tools have they for life on the ground ? They 
 must dig for worms, grubs and insects. They must 
 be able to peck through a chestnut-shuck or hazel-nut. 
 They have a host of enemies to contend with. Foxes, 
 rats, weasels, and opossums on the ground ; and 
 hawks, owls, and eagles in the air, are watching for 
 their flesh, and they are an almost constant terror by 
 
BIRDS OF THE LAND. 
 
 181 
 
 day and by night. These they must either fight, or 
 escape from by flying or by running. 
 
 A short, stout beak, with the upper jaw turning its 
 sharp point a little down over the under jaw, gives 
 them a good instrument to* peck with. What could 
 they do with the bill of the duck, or the crane, or the 
 woodcock ? The leg is of medium length, is set near 
 the middle of the body, and is suited to running. The 
 foot ends in four toes. The hind toe is set a little 
 higher than the three front ones, and is long enough 
 to cling to the perch. The front toes have scarcely 
 any web between them, and are armed with thick, 
 strong claws for scratching. What could these birds, 
 that must scratch for 
 a living, do with such 
 claws as ducks and 
 snipes have ? The 
 wings are strong, and 
 rather round than 
 pointed ; but they are 
 good for flying short 
 distances. 
 
 Every one, who as 
 a child lived in the 
 country, retains pleas- 
 ant recollections of 
 Bob White. His true name is Virginia partridge. 
 
 California Quail. 
 
 He 
 
 is ten inches long, and he has a very near relation 
 the ruffed grouse which is sixteen inches long. In 
 New England and the North, this grouse is called a 
 partridge, and Bob White a quail. In the Southern 
 states Bob is named a partridge. 
 
1 82 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Bob White's habits are similar to those of his near 
 kj n the prairie-hen, the ruffed grouse, the California 
 helmet quail, and several other scratching birds. The 
 nest is made on the ground, usually in a tuft of grass 
 under a bush. From twelve to twenty white eggs are 
 there deposited, and when the brood is hatched they 
 are far more lively than chickens. I have often come 
 upon the little hen-quail with her chicks. She is then 
 a most skillful actor. She flutters before my feet, pre- 
 tends to be lame, and to have a broken wing. 
 
 The growing brood becomes a flying flock or " cov- 
 ey." The covey keeps very closely to the ground. 
 They run swiftly. They roost on the ground. On 
 trees or bushes they would be too much at the mercy 
 of hungry owls. When preparing for the night, they 
 huddle together in a close circle with their tails at the 
 center and their heads at the circumference, so that, 
 when surprised, they may fly in all directions. 
 
 43. THE CAMEL-BIRD. 
 
 THE true camel-bird is the ostrich of the African 
 plains. Its kindred are the South American ostrich, 
 or rhea, and the emu of Australia. The African os- 
 trich has two toes, and the others have three toes on 
 each foot. The feathers of none are so fine as those 
 of the camel-bird. When full-grown, this bird stands 
 about seven feet high, and weighs from a hundred to a 
 hundred and fifty pounds. Its wings are too short for 
 
THE CAMEL-BIRD. 183 
 
 flight, although they help to increase its speed, when 
 running. 
 
 The ostrich is strictly a land bird. Its breast is flat 
 like a raft, and not keel-shaped like the breast of the 
 swimming and flying birds. Its usefulness consists 
 almost wholly in the beauty and value of. its rich 
 plumes. Long before King Pharaoh of Egypt used 
 the feathers for royal ornaments, the ostrich and its gay 
 dress were known and prized. Since it has become a 
 member of the public gardens, and has been introduced 
 upon farms in California, great interest has gathered 
 about this feathered camel. 
 
 In the wild desert plains, the bird is so shy and 
 wary that it is hunted and captured with great diffi- 
 culty. The swiftest Arab horse would never run it 
 down, were it not that the horse can endure longer than 
 the ostrich. 
 
 The nest is scooped out in the surface of the sand, 
 and in it several birds may deposit their eggs. The 
 males do the sitting, and are more affectionate to the 
 young than are the females. During the heat of the 
 day the nest is left to the power of the sun. The egg 
 of the ostrich is about six inches long, and weighs as 
 much as twenty-four eggs of the common hen. 
 
 On the farms in south Africa and in California, the 
 eggs are gathered daily from the nests, and are after- 
 wards hatched in artificial ovens, or incubators. The 
 Romans used something like the incubator for hatch- 
 ing. The habit which the old birds have of eating 
 stones, bits of iron and glass, pieces of leather, and 
 almost every thing that happens to be lying about, 
 seems to begin early in life. The young birds are 
 
1 84 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 plucked at six months of age, and about every six or 
 nine months thereafter. The feathers of a grown bird, 
 at a single -plucking, have been sold for a hundred and 
 fifty dollars. 
 
 When Rome was at the height of her luxury a dish 
 of ostrich's brains was considered a great treat. A 
 gluttonous and cruel emperor had as many as six hun- 
 dred ostriches killed to make one meal of brains. 
 
 ^gVo-^ 
 
 South African Ostriches. 
 
 "A traveler was once staying in a village where 
 there were two tame ostriches. Two little boys used 
 to mount on their backs, and have a ride. The os- 
 triches would run round and round the village, and 
 never seem inclined to stop. At first their pace was a 
 trot ; but by degrees they expanded their wings and ran 
 very fast indeed, scarcely seeming to touch the ground. 
 No race-horse could have 'kept up with them, though 
 the ostriches would have got tired much the soonest." 
 
BIRDS OF THE AIR THE PIGEON. 
 
 i8 5 
 
 44. BIRDS OF THE AIR THE PIGEON. 
 
 THE pigeon would fare poorly on the ground ; much 
 more so in the water. Its feet look as if they might 
 scratch, but they are far from being a match for the 
 quail's feet. Ground birds must be runners. But the 
 pigeon can fly indeed it can. The wild pigeon, next 
 
 Wild Pigeon. 
 
 to the frigate-bird of the ocean, is the swiftest of fly- 
 ers. From seventy to a hundred miles an hour is its 
 rate of speed. It seeks safety in its wings. Its food 
 grows mainly upon trees. It sleeps in the tree-top. 
 It nests there. " It is a bird of the air. 
 
 The passenger pigeon is seventeen inches long from 
 
1 86 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 tip of bill to tip of tail. The mourning dove of our 
 orchards is twelve inches long. The common barn- 
 pigeons, and all the fancy birds pouters, carriers, runts, 
 barbs, fantails, tumblers, trumpeters, and so forth, in- 
 cluding a hundred and fifty varieties are derived di- 
 rectly from the wild rock-pigeon of Europe. 
 
 Pigeons eat fruit, seeds, and grain. I have shot 
 them at their roosts in the far north, and found their 
 crops filled with large acorns. I wondered how they 
 could swallow, and much more how they could digest 
 the hard, bitter things. But the pigeon has a good 
 stomach. The crop is double, and softens the hard 
 shucks and kernels, after which the gizzard, with its 
 pair of ribbed mill-stones, grinds them well. 
 
 The young pigeons are hatched both naked and 
 blind, and are carefully tended by the two parents. 
 You have heard, perhaps, of pigeons' milk. It is no 
 fiction. When there are young to be fed, the parents 
 have glands in their crops which secrete or separate 
 from the food a kind of milk ; and this is the nourish- 
 ment which the old birds pump into the mouths of 
 their tender squabs. Then the pigeon drinks, not like 
 a chicken, but like a horse, holding its bill in the 
 water till it has enough. 
 
 The true carrier pigeon, which is now called by fan- 
 ciers the homing pigeon, is by far the most interest- 
 ing of the tame varieties. It may wear a variety of 
 colors, and is a most meek, modest, delicate looking 
 creature. Its instinct or love for home has been cul- 
 tivated for a great many centuries. It is trained by 
 ta'king it short, and then longer distances from home, 
 and allowing it to return on the wing. Even as far 
 
BIRDS OF THE AIR THE PIGEON. 
 
 I8 7 
 
 back as five hundred years before Christ, the messen- 
 ger pigeon was employed to convey letters between 
 lovers. The letters in those days were tied to the 
 feet ; in these days the message is tied to the tail 
 feathers, as shown in the illustration. The speed of 
 these birds is about fifty miles an hour, in a trip of five 
 hundred miles. The Romans employed messenger pig- 
 eons to convey messages in war. 
 
188 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Bald Eagle. 
 
 45. "LIONS OF THE AIR 
 
 WERE the birds of prey arranged in a line accord- 
 ing to their sizes, there would be at one end of the 
 row the pigeon-hawk eleven inches long, and at the 
 other end the South American condor three and a 
 half feet long, from bill to tail, and nine feet between 
 the tips of its extended wings. 
 
 Young readers in the country are acquainted with 
 these " lions" through the chicken-hawk and the owl. 
 
" LIONS OF THE AIR." 189 
 
 City folk may, perhaps, see the king of the air as a 
 captive in the zoological garden. It is fondly hoped 
 that every reader carries in his pocket, at least occa- 
 sionally, a feeble portrait of him impressed on one side 
 of the American silver dollar. 
 
 They are great flyers. The condor of South Amer- 
 ica soars to the height of twenty thousand feet above 
 the level of the sea. These creatures have a wonder- 
 ful power of sight. Vultures and turkey buzzards 
 find the dead bodies on which they feed, not by scent, 
 but by sight. The fish-hawk, at a height of over a 
 hundred feet in the air, can see a minnow under the 
 water. The owl at night can discern a bat as quickly 
 as a cat spies a mouse in the dark. 
 
 Of eagles there are two prominent kinds in this 
 country. The golden eagle lives in mountainous dis- 
 tricts. The bald eagle, or "bird of Washington," 
 shows itself occasionally in nearly all parts of the 
 country. It is not really bald, but when three years 
 old has its head covered with white feathers. The 
 bald eagle is a grand, princely bird in appearance, and 
 for this reason was chosen as our nation's emblem. 
 The great and good Benjamin Franklin objected to its 
 selection for that purpose, and preferred the turkey. 
 
 The lion of the African desert is not better armed 
 for his lordly cruelty than are these lions of the air. 
 What beaks they have ! Strong, short, sharp-edged, 
 and hooked. What fearful claws! These are the first 
 birds we find that use the claw as a hand. The living 
 prey the mouse, the chick or the child is caught and 
 held by the claws, and is borne away. The claws of 
 the Alpine eagle are not fitted for this work. 
 
LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 The story of this eagle causing the death of ^Eschylus 
 (F/skilus) may be true ; and if so, it is a warning to 
 bald-headed people to wear their hats in the presence 
 of great eagles. ^Eschylus was a Grecian poet who 
 lived about five hundred years before Christ. On ac- 
 count of some serious charges made against him, he 
 was banished from his country and took up his resi- 
 dence in Sicily. Once, while sitting in a wild and se- 
 cluded place, with his smooth and venerable head ex- 
 
 posed, the great Alpine eagle 
 was sailing in the air above 
 him, carrying a tortoise. 
 
 It is the habit of eagles 
 and of some other birds, 
 when they have a turtle in 
 seizing ciaw. hand, to rise high in the air 
 
 and drop it on a rock so as to break its shell. At 
 this moment, when the poor old man was thinking of 
 nothing but his heart troubles, the eagle mistook him 
 for a rock ; and with wonderful precision, let the tor- 
 toise drop on his bald head. And alas ! ^Eschylus 
 was killed. 
 
 Eagles, hawks, and buzzards are diurnal birds of 
 prey. Owls are nocturnal birds of prey, and are called 
 "cats of the air." Nearly all birds have the eyes on 
 opposite sides of the head, so that with one eye they 
 can watch their prey, while with the other eye they 
 can observe the movements of their enemies. 
 
 Owls going out on their hunts at night, are not in 
 danger from other stronger inhabitants of the air, for 
 these are all asleep. They have only to look for their 
 victims; and, therefore, their eyes are in the face or 
 
LIONS OF THE AIR. 
 
 Great Horned Owl. 
 
 front part of the head. They have beaks and claws 
 essentially like those of the day-birds of prey. 
 
 Our most common night-birds of prey are the little 
 screech owl, about nine inches long ; the barn owl, 
 fifteen inches long ; the snowy owl, two feet long ; and 
 the great horned owl of the same length. 
 
I 9 2 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 46. MONKEYS IN FEATHERS. 
 
 THE monkey is an imitator of man's actions, while 
 the parrot is a mimic of man's talk. 
 
 That (< Polly" has a high degree of intelligence no 
 one can doubt, for he sometimes talks in such a way 
 as to indicate that he reasons. A parrot show was 
 
 Gray Parrot. 
 
 held in the north of England, at which prizes were of- 
 fered for the best talking powers. Several birds had 
 exhibited their efforts, when a gray parrot was let out 
 of his cage. Seeing the large company before him, 
 he at once exclaimed, "By Jove, what a lot of par- 
 rots! " The prize was at once given to him. 
 
 The climbing organs of the parrot are all plain to 
 
MONKEYS IN FEATHERS. 
 
 193 
 
 the eye. First the bill how odd and awkward it ap- 
 pears ! But it does nice work. The under jaw is a 
 stumpy, stubby affair, but presses, up, and cuts and 
 cracks with great power. The upper jaw turning down 
 like a long curved hook, moves up and down on a 
 kind of loose hinge. 
 
 The birds of prey make quite a hand of the claw. 
 The parrot's claw is still more of a hand. The hawk 
 throws three toes 
 forward for fingers, 
 and one backward 
 for a thumb; the 
 parrot extends two 
 before, and two be- 
 hind for thumbs. 
 
 The little green 
 Carolina parrot, or 
 parakeet, is the on- 
 ly member of the 
 order which is na- 
 tive to our country. 
 It is a genuine par- 
 rot. Its color is 
 green, with a yellow 
 head, and it is about twelve inches long. In former 
 times, say seventy years ago, it was abundant as far 
 north as the Ohio River, and was seen even at Albany, 
 New York. 
 
 The ring parrot, which is also present in the garden, 
 is from India and Africa. It was the only one known 
 to the ancients. Aristotle, the Greek naturalist, refers 
 to it as the " Indian bird which is said to have a tongue 
 
 L.C.-is. 
 
 Carolina Parrot. 
 
194 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 like a man, and to be most talkative when intoxicated. " 
 The large gray parrot is from Africa and Madagascar. 
 It is the best talkej among parrots. 
 
 A parrot in Pennsylvania recently brought about a 
 lawsuit. Two men had an angry dispute about a bill, 
 in a room in the house of the debtor. As they raised 
 their voices to a high key, a shrill voice in the next 
 room cried: "Kick him out! kick him out! kick 
 him out!" The creditor thought it was the debtor's 
 wife who was advising him to commit assault. 
 
 Springing up in a great rage he said he would go 
 without being kicked out, but he would surely be 
 heard from. He then went straight to a justice of the 
 peace, and brought suit. At the trial it was proved 
 that it was a parrot, and not the man's wife, who had 
 advised the kicking out. 
 
 47. RED-HEAD AND HIS MUSIC. 
 
 OF our ruby-throat humming-bird, Mr. Burroughs 
 says: "Nature has given him a jewel upon his tKroat, 
 but no song save the hum of his wings." His wing- 
 power is almost a miracle. While he examines a 
 flower he stands in the air. His bill is like that of 
 the woodpecker, and enables him to draw out an in- 
 sect from the bottom of a trumpet-flower. 
 
 Something about their bills gives interest to the 
 flicker or yellow hammer, to the little spotted downy 
 woodpecker, and to our common red-head. This bill 
 
RED-HEAD AND HIS MUSIC. 
 
 195 
 
 of the woodpecker does the work of a gimlet and 
 chisel. The tongue within the bill is even more re- 
 markable. On the end of it are barbs, and it gives out 
 a sticky fluid, so that the tongue can 
 reach far into a worm-hole and pull 
 the victim out of its retreat. 
 
 The toes of these birds are a little Yoked Tofc3 ' 
 like those of the parrot. They are yoked. Two are 
 thrown before and two behind, so that they can more 
 easily cling to the bark or bare wood of a tree's trunk. 
 The tail helps a little to hold Red-head up ; for you will 
 observe that he presses his tail against the tree. 
 
 Does the woodpecker sing? The Duke of Argyle, 
 who lives in Scotland, after watching very closely, con- 
 cluded that this bird 
 with a chisel-bill makes 
 music to please his 
 mate, as truly as the 
 thrush or robin does ; 
 only his music is in- 
 strumental. The wood- 
 pecker is a drummer.- 
 He often thumps his 
 bill on a dead or dry 
 limb, merely to please 
 his companion. Now 
 let me describe what I 
 have seen and heard. 
 
 One day I was walking on the railroad track, when I 
 heard a tapping and ringing noise from the top of a tele- 
 graph pole. The noise began and ended at regular in- 
 tervals. Carefully moving my position, I saw him and 
 
 Bed-head. 
 
196 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 caught him in the act. Red-head had found a better 
 drum than a hollow tree ; he was drumming on the 
 glass knob, or insulator, of the telegraph pole. 
 
 Several times he flew away and as often returned, 
 each time beating the ringing tones from the glass, evi- 
 dently as happy as a small boy with a new drum. Had 
 I known, when I was a boy, about this musical trick in 
 Red-head, I should not, as I frequently did, have left 
 his charmed mate a widow. 
 
 48. THE CANARY. 
 
 AFTER the death of my wood-lark I was so grieved 
 at the loss, that my father bought me a pair of cana- 
 ries, the first of these birds I had ever seen. I was 
 delighted, charmed, and never weary, for at least two 
 hours, of contemplating the bright yellow dress of the 
 male, and the pale, primrose costume of his mate. 
 
 It was spring-time when they were given to me, if 
 I remember rightly, and the cage was hung in the 
 window of the nursery. How splendidly that bird 
 sang! The nightingales in the little beechen copse at 
 the foot of the garden, were as nothing compared to 
 him, I thought; and very likely he sang louder than 
 they did. After a time, my mother put a little wicker 
 basket lined with flannel, into the cage, and in a few 
 days four or five little pale-blue eggs, speckled with 
 brown, were laid. 
 
 The young were hatched in due time, to the great 
 
THE CANARY. 197 
 
 delight of the parent birds who stood together on the 
 edge of the basket, attentively looking -down at the 
 ugly, helpless, pink little things below. 
 
 The origin of the tame canary is, unfortunately, lost 
 in obscurity; for the story that connects it with the 
 shipwreck off the Island of Elba and the Canary Isles 
 is voted by common consent as unworthy of belief. 
 However that may be, there are at the present day 
 several distinct varieties of canary. 
 
 Canaries vary in song as much as they do in shape 
 and color. Some have the sky-lark, others the wood- 
 lark, and still others the nightingale note. Some have 
 a song consisting of loud, harsh shrieks which is very 
 unpleasant to" listen to. A canary, if taught while 
 quite young, will generally pick up any air that is reg- 
 ularly whistled to it, or played on a flageolet ; but the 
 lesson must be often repeated. 
 
198 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 49. THE CROW. 
 
 THE common American crow is black, like the three 
 crows of the old story. It is a foot and a half long. 
 The raven is about two feet long, and is simply a larger 
 crow. Crows make their presence known by their 
 "cawing," which is not a very pleasant noise; it can 
 not be called music or song. 
 
 The crow has a fine eye, and a rather long and 
 strong beak. The food it prefers consists of insects, 
 worms, grubs, mice, moles, and shell-fish rather soft 
 food, you observe. The bill of the bird, though stout, 
 is not hard, nor is his stomach adapted to grinding 
 and digesting hard food. When a bird has a soft bill 
 it also has a soft stomach. 
 
 If a crow is driven by hunger to eat hard corn, he 
 seldom swallows the kernel whole, but with the fine 
 curved point of his bill picks out the germ or soft 
 part of the kernel. In corn-planting time, before the 
 mice, beetles, and bird's eggs, which they love, abound, 
 the crow-family visit the farmer's planted corn. They 
 soon find out that the old men set up about the field 
 have neither muscle, blood nor bone ; and they dig up 
 and devour the sprouting seed. Why? Because this 
 corn has become soft, and the bird can digest it. 
 
 The wit and cunning of this bird in a clerical dress 
 is proved, when it becomes a tamed pet. A writer 
 in the Indiana Farmer says : ' ' We have a pet crow 
 that was taken from the nest last spring, and if there 
 is any thing that escapes him I do not know what it is. 
 He will carry away knives, spoons, forks, screw-driv- 
 
THE CROW. 
 
 199 
 
 ers, tape, or nails. One day, while our backs were 
 turned, he stole the blueing-bag out of the wash-tub, 
 and we had a big chase before we got it again. 
 
 " We have a pup. His name is Gip. The crow's 
 name is Jim. The pup and the crow play together 
 like two kittens. It makes no difference which name 
 we call, they will both come. Mischievous Jim has 
 
 Jim and Gip. 
 
 the advantage of Gip, as he can fly up when he has 
 any thing in his mouth that he doesn't want Gip to 
 have. Jim can bark like Gip, or laugh like us; and 
 he can make more different kinds of noise in one hour 
 than any bird I ever saw, or heard of. He will untie 
 our aprons, and will steal every pin from our clothes, 
 and all the buttons he can find." 
 
200 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 Robin's Foot. 
 
 around a twig. 
 
 5O. FACTS ABOUT BIRDS. 
 
 THE foot of the robin, or of the canary, is a poor 
 tool for scratching. The long hind toe is sadly in the 
 way. On the chicken's foot this toe is short, and is 
 set up out of the way. How do these little birds 
 move on the ground ? What birds of 
 the air walk like the chicken, putting 
 one foot before the other ? With long 
 toes and exceedingly sharp nails, the 
 robin's foot is made to cleave tightly 
 We call it a perching foot. The hind 
 toe grasps precisely opposite the middle front toe. 
 
 The canary cracks and eats seeds and cuttle-fish. 
 Is not its bill fitted for such work? The robin, or 
 the brown thrasher, picking its worm from the sod 
 has use for a longer bill, 
 while there seems to be 
 no need of a hard bill. 
 The canary is a seed-eater ; 
 the robin is a worm-eater. 
 The canary and its nu- 
 merous cousins form a 
 family of finches. The rob- 
 in and its kin are a family 
 of thrushes. The question 
 may arise why some birds 
 
 Goldfinches. 
 
 migrate to warmer regions 
 
 to pass the winter, while others remain throughout 
 the year. Those that go are mostly worm-eaters, whose 
 food the winter hides or destroys. Those that stay are 
 
FACTS ABOUT BIRDS. 
 
 201 
 
 chiefly seed-eaters, whose food is not 
 
 covered by snow or frost. 
 
 Many birds have air-tubes connect- 
 ing their lungs with their hollow 
 
 bones ; so that, in flying, the air passes 
 
 into all parts of the body and makes 
 
 it lighter. The real mystery of flight 
 
 is in the birds' wings. Could any 
 
 thing be at once so light and so strong 
 
 as the quill, which is the lower, naked 
 
 part of the feather? 
 
 Then look at the vane, or web, 
 
 which is fastened to the after-shaft 
 
 the upper part of the feather. Each 
 
 layer of the vane is called a barb, and 
 
 cleaves closely to its fellow by hooks, Fi *' 13 ' Feather - 
 
 or barbules, as is seen in the magnified barbs (Fig. 
 
 13), on either side of the quill. This arrangement 
 
 makes the feather a 
 wonderfully strong and 
 light oar to row the 
 bird-ship. 
 
 Young birds, like 
 : ; young children, must 
 ;J learn their songs. The 
 i singing muscles of the 
 child are in the upper 
 part of the windpipe, 
 and can only be suc- 
 cessfully used by prac- 
 tice. The singing mus- 
 cles of the bird are in the lower part of the wind- 
 
 House "Wren. 
 
202 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 pipe, and the bird acquires the art of using them by 
 practice. 
 
 The useful birds, and the birds of song, must be 
 protected. Chimney swifts, and swallows, with deep- 
 cut mouths for catching flies on the wing, are our 
 
 . t friends. The little 
 
 -^^ house-wren, though 
 
 saucy, is a nice singer, 
 and should have a box 
 for its nest. A thou- 
 sand insects, in a single 
 day, have been carried 
 by a pair of wrens to 
 their young. 
 
 Among the star' 
 lings, that have stout, 
 rather long and cutting bills, are the oriole, the mead- 
 ow-lark and the bobolink. The bobolink is the only 
 black and white bird west of the Mississippi. He is 
 full of joy and music. Of all the songsters none takes 
 deeper hold of the heart than the song-sparrow he 
 is so cheery, so trustful of his human friends. He 
 sings from seven to ten different tunes. 
 
 Bobolinks. 
 
 51. A BIRD NATION. 
 
 THE pilgrim fathers and mothers of the innumerable 
 nation of house-sparrows came from England to this 
 country, in the year 1852. It was a mistake to bring 
 in seed-eaters to catch canker-worms. In England, a 
 
A BIRD NATION. 
 
 203 
 
 hundred years ago, they were disturbers ; and they 
 were charged by Mr. White, of Selborne, with destroy- 
 ing swallows, robbing martins, and indirectly increas- 
 ing harmful insects. 
 
 But they came ; and after a few generations, they 
 found this great, free country just the place for a great 
 sparrow nation. Living in our villages and cities, they 
 would escape the terrors of owls and hawks. So they 
 
 House-sparrows Attacking a Cat. 
 
 have gone on increasing, learning all the bad ways of 
 city life, but none of the good ways. From a single 
 pair come five or six broods a year; and, if unop- 
 posed, two hundred and seventy-five billions of birds 
 in ten years. They have already spread over a terri- 
 tory of one million square miles. 
 
 There is a long list of crimes against them. They 
 delight to plunder lettuce, peas, beets, cabbage, fruit 
 
204 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 buds, and fruit of peach, pear, plum, cherry, apple, 
 and grape. Fifty of them have been counted on a 
 single shock of farmer's grain. 
 
 They kill and drive away useful birds and sweet sing- 
 ers ; so that, in place of the inoffensive and musical 
 wren, robin, and song-sparrow, we have the plunder 
 and creech-creech of the house-sparrow. Besides mak- 
 ing war upon our pretty home birds, they refuse to do 
 the useful work of these birds. The tussock caterpil- 
 lar, that devours the 
 foliage of nearly every 
 tree, is so covered with 
 sharp bristles that most 
 birds will not touch it. 
 But the oriole, the rob- 
 in, and the cuckoos at- 
 tack it, and the yellow- 
 billed cuckoo even 
 shears the bristles of 
 the worm before swal- 
 lowing it. The armies 
 of our little ruffians, however, drive away the robins 
 and the cuckoos, and leave our trees to the mercy of 
 the caterpillars. They will not work for us, nor will 
 they allow our old friends to work for us. 
 
 As fighters, they have no equals among small birds. 
 One alone is weak, but many together are strong. 
 When one gets into trouble he calls a regiment to help 
 him. In one instance, they are reported to have killed 
 a cat. But they make good pot-pies. Let us then 
 rise and eat the sparrow nation, or the sparrow nation 
 may grow strong enough to eat us. 
 
 Song->sparrow. 
 
THE GREAT SINGERS. 
 
 205 
 
 52. THE GREAT SINGERS. 
 
 THE poets are lovers of 
 children, flowers, and birds. 
 Without the song of birds, 
 the summer would be as 
 cheerless as if it were 
 without children and flow- 
 ers. But there is a differ- 
 ence in the power and 
 sweetness of bird-song, as 
 there is a difference in the 
 beauty of flowers and the 
 attractiveness of children. 
 
 The English poets lead 
 us to think that no feath- 
 ered songsters can compare 
 with the sky-lark and the 
 
 nightingale. The poet European Nightingale. 
 
 Montgomery tells us something of their habits: 
 
 "The bird that soars on highest wing, 
 Builds on the ground her lowly nest ; 
 
 And she that doth most sweetly sing, 
 Sings in the shade when all things rest. 
 
 In lark and nightingale we see 
 What honor hath humility." 
 
 The nightingale, called Philomel, seems to have been 
 the favorite bird of Milton : 
 
 " Sweet bird, that shun'st the noise of folly, 
 
 Most musical, most melancholy, 
 Thee, chantress, oft the woods among 
 I woo, to hear thy evening song." 
 
206 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 English Sky-lark. 
 
 Americans are usu- 
 ally disappointed when 
 they first hear the sky- 
 lark and the nightin- 
 gale. They think our 
 own great singers have 
 finer voices, though 
 we have fewer great 
 poets to extol them. 
 The sky-lark sings 
 while it soars, and pours its notes down upon the ear, 
 when itself has risen out of sight. Hence Shakespeare 
 says: 
 
 "Hark! hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings." 
 
 And Tennyson adds: 
 
 "And drowned in yonder living blue,. 
 The lark becomes a sightless song." 
 
 With the first warm breath of summer, our wood 
 thrush, with reddish back and mottled breast, plays 
 his flute, sweet and * 
 
 clear, in rising and fall- 
 ing measures. 
 
 And we have our 
 nightingale, or night- 
 singer the Southern 
 mocking-bird. His 
 
 best song is in the 
 woods, where Long- 
 fellow finds him sing- 
 
 . . . - r Mocking-bird. 
 
 ing to the sad heart of 
 
 Evangeline in search of her lover in the wild South-west : 
 
THE GREAT SINGERS. 
 
 207 
 
 "Then from a neighboring thicket the mocking-bird, wildest of 
 
 singers, 
 
 Swinging aloft on a willow spray that hangs o'er the water, 
 Shook from his little throat such floods of delirious music, 
 That the whole air and the woods and the waves seemed silent 
 
 to listen." 
 
 Mr. Champlin, of New York, with a coaching party 
 in England, witnessed the flight and song of five sky- 
 larks together. After this unusual concert, he says of 
 the American mocking-bird's song: "It is sweeter, 
 
 Prairie-lark. 
 
 richer, mellower, more varied and more brilliant, of 
 greater compass, more powerful and more prolonged 
 than that of any songster in British woods." 
 
 Our most remarkable bird-vocalist seems to be the 
 western meadow-lark, or prairie-lark. Because of its 
 superiority, and because few had noticed it, Audubon 
 called it neglecta. It is essentially the same, in form 
 and colors, as the common meadow-lark, or starling. 
 
208 
 
 LIVING CREATURES. 
 
 It differs in habits, and is greatly superior in song. In 
 the prairie country of the North-west, it sings early 
 and late in the season ; early and late in the day. It 
 sings at rest and it sings while soaring. 
 
 Mr. Ernest E. Thompson, whose experienced hand 
 Jias drawn many of the bird-pictures that adorn these 
 pages, has made the acquaintance of all the great sing- 
 ers, at home and abroad, in their native haunts ; and 
 of the prairie-lark he says: "It is one of two or three 
 great ones of the world of bird-song." 
 
 We have, also, our sky-lark. In the region of the 
 upper Missouri River is the Missouri titlark, that rises 
 into the air while he sings a tune which some people 
 think quite equal to that of the European sky-lark. 
 
 Let us open our ears and hearts to the beauty and 
 melody of the birds. Like the joy of the sunshine 
 and flowers; like the cheer of pleasant faces; like the 
 charm of kind words, good books, and loving friends, 
 they help to lighten the load of life. 
 
Living ere