II.

"Dar nach schlouch er schiere, einen wisent und einen elch,Starcher ure viere, und einen grimmen schelch.""After this he straightway slew a bison and an elk,Of the strong uri four, and a single fierce schelch."[58]

"Dar nach schlouch er schiere, einen wisent und einen elch,Starcher ure viere, und einen grimmen schelch."

"After this he straightway slew a bison and an elk,Of the strong uri four, and a single fierce schelch."[58]

It is a formidable beast, standing six feet high at the shoulders, where it is protected by a thick and profuse mane. Specimens have been known to reach a ton in weight. It manifests an invincible repugnance to the ox.

There are several other animals of note which, like the Bison, were once common inhabitants of these islands, but have long been extinct here, though more genial circumstances have preserved their existence on the continent of Europe. Of the great Cave Bear, no evidence of its period exists, that I know of, except that which may be deduced from the commixture of its remains with those of other animals of whose recent date we have proof. But there is another kind of Bear, whose relics in a fossil state are not uncommon in the Tertiary deposits, viz., the common Black Bear (Ursus arctos) of Europe.

This savage animal must have early succumbed to man.The "Triads"[59]mention bears as living here before the Kymri came. The Roman poets knew of their existence here: Martial speaks of the robber Laureolus being exposed on the cross to the fangs of theCaledonianBear; and Claudian alludes to British bears. The Emperor Claudius, on his return to Rome after the conquest of this island, exhibited, as trophies, combats of British bears in the arena. In the Penitential of Archbishop Egbert, said to have been compiled aboutA.D.750, bears are mentioned as inhabiting the English forests, but they must have gradually become rare, for the chase-laws of Canute, at the beginning of the eleventh century, are silent about them. In Doomsday Book, we find incidental notice of this animal, for the city of Norwich is said to have been required to furnish a bear annually to Edward the Confessor, together with "six dogs for the bear,"—no doubt for baiting him. This seems to have been the latest trace on record of the bear in Britain; unless the tradition may compete with it, which states that one of the Gordon family was empowered by the king of Scotland to carry three bears' heads on his banner, as a reward for his prowess in slaying a fierce bear.

In Ireland it seems to have become extinct even yet earlier. Bede says the only ravenous animals in his day were the wolf and the fox; Donatus, who died inA.D.840, distinctly says it was not a native of the island in his time; and Geraldus Cambrensis does not enumerate it as known in the twelfth century. Neither is it included inthe ransom-beasts of Cailte's collection. Yet a native Irish name for the bear—Mathghambain—occurs in an old glossary[60]in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin; and the late Wm. Thomson says that a tradition is current of its having once been an Irish animal; and it is associated with the wolf as a native beast in the stories handed down from generation to generation to the present time.

The wolf, however, survived in both islands to a much later era. In the days of the Heptarchy it was a terrible pest; King Edgar commuted the punishment of certain offences into a requisition for a fixed number of wolves' tongues; and he converted a heavy tax on one of the Welsh princes into an annual tribute of three hundred wolves' heads. These laws continued to the time of Edward I., when the increasing scarcity of the animal doubtless caused them to fall into disuse. Mr Topham, in his Notes to Somerville's "Chase," says, that it was in the wolds of Yorkshire that a price was last set on a wolf's head. The last record of their occurring in formidable numbers in England is in 1281; but for three centuries after this, the mountains and forests of Scotland harboured them; for Hollinshed reports that in 1577 the wolves were very troublesome to the flocks of that country. Nor were they entirely destroyed out of this island till about a century afterwards, when the last wolf fell in Lochaber, by the hand of Sir Ewen Cameron of Lochiel. In Ireland the last wolf was slain in 1710.

Thus here we are able to lay our finger on the exact dates when a large and rapacious species of animal actually became extinct so far as the British Isles are concerned. And if the species had been confined in its geographical limits, as many other species of animals are, to one group of islands, we should know the precise date of its absolute extinction.

The Beaver was once an inhabitant of British rivers. Its remains are found in Berkshire, Cambridgeshire, Yorkshire, and elsewhere, associated with the other Mammalia of the fresh-water deposits and caves, but not in any abundance. No record of its actual existence, however, in these counties exists, nor anywhere else but in Wales and Scotland, whose mountain streams and rugged ravines afforded it shelter till after the Norman Conquest. It was very rare even then, and for a hundred years before; for the laws of Howel Dda, the Welsh king, who died in 948, in determining the value of peltry, fix the price of the beaver's skin at a hundred and twenty pence, when the skins of the stag, the wolf, the fox, and the otter, were worth only eightpence each, that of the white weasel or ermine at twelvepence, and that of the marten, at twenty-four pence. The appropriate epithet of Broad-tail (Llostllyddan) was given it by the Welsh. Giraldus Cambrensis, who travelled through Wales in 1188, gives, in his Itinerary, a short account of the beaver, but states that the river Teivy in Cardiganshire, and one other river in Scotland, were the only places in Great Britain, where it was then found. In all probability it did not long survive thatcentury, for no subsequent notice of it as a British animal is extant. Tradition, however, still preserves the remembrance of its presence in those indelible records, names of places. "Two or three waters in the Principality," says Pennant, "still bear the name ofLlyn yr afangc,—the Beaver Lake.... I have seen two of their supposed haunts: one in the stream that runs through Nant Francon; the other in the river Conwy, a few miles above Llanrwst; and both places, in all probability, had formerly been crossed by beaver-dams."

If, as naturalists of the highest eminence believe, there is specific difference between the beaver of Europe and that of America, then we may say that our species is fast passing away from the earth. A few colonies yet linger along the banks of the Danube, the Weser, the Rhone and the Euphrates, but they consist of few individuals, ever growing fewer; and the value of their fur exciting cupidity, they cannot probably resist much longer the exterminating violence of man.

The causes which led to the extinction of these animals in our islands are then obvious, and are thus playfully touched by the late James Wilson:—"The beaver might have carried on business well enough, in his own quiet way, although frequently incommoded by the love of peltry on the part of a hat-wearing people; but it is clear that no man with a small family and a few respectable farm servants, could either permit a large and hungry wolf to be continually peeping at midnight through the keyhole of the nursery, or allow a brawny bruin to snufftoo frequently under the kitchen door (after having hugged the watch-dog to death) when the servant-maids were at supper. The extirpation then of at least two of these quondam British species became 'a work of necessity and mercy,' and might have been tolerated even on a Sunday, (between sermons,) especially as naturalists have it still in their power to study the habits of similar wild beasts, by no means yet extinct, in the neighbouring countries of France and Germany."[61]

Perhaps the example of recent extinction most popularly known is that of the Dodo, a very remarkable bird, which about two centuries ago existed in considerable abundance, in the isles of Mauritius, Bourbon, and Rodriguez. It was a rather large fowl, incapable of rising from the ground, by reason of the imperfect development of its wings, of massive, uncouth figure, predisposed to fatness, and noted for the sapidity of its flesh. Two skulls and two unmatched feet of this strange bird are preserved in European museums; and these shew that its nearest affinities were with the pigeon-tribe, of which we know some species of terrestrial habits, but none approaching this bird in its absolute confinement to the earth.

In the reports of numerous voyagers who visited these islands from the end of the fifteenth century to the middle of the seventeenth, we have many accounts of the appearance and habits of this bird, evidently sketched from the life. Some of the descriptions, as also the figures by whichthey are illustrated, are quaint enough; as, for example, that graphic sketch hit off by old Sir Thomas Herbert, who saw the bird in his travels in 1634:—

"The Dodo," he says, "comes first to our description. Here and in Dygarrois (and nowhere else that I cdever see or heare of) is generated the Dodo. (A Portuguize name it is, and has reference to her simplenes) a bird which for shape and rareness might be call'd a Phœnix (wer't in Arabia); her body is round and extreame fat, her slow pace begets that corpulencie; few of them weigh lesse than fifty pound: better to the eye than the stomack: greasie appetites may perhaps commend them, but, to the indifferently curious, nourishment, but prove offensive. Let's take her picture: her visage darts forth melancholy, as sensible of nature's injurie in framing so great and massive a body to be directed by such small and complementall wings, as are unable to hoise her from the ground, serving only to prove her a bird; which otherwise might be doubted of: her head is variously drest, the one halfe hooded with downy blackish feathers; the other perfectly naked; of a whitish hue, as if a transparent lawne had covered it; her bill is very howked and bends downwards, the thrill or breathing place is in the midst of it; from which part to the end, the colour is a light greene mixt with a pale yellow; her eyes be round and small, and bright as diamonds; her cloathing is of finest downe, such as ye see in goslins; her trayne is (like a China beard) of three or foureshort feythers; her legs thick, and black, and strong; her tallons or pounces sharp; her stomack fiery hot, so as stones and yron are easilie digested in it; in that and shape, not a little resembling the Africk oestriches: but so much, as for their more certain dyfference I dare to give thee (with two others) her representation."[62]

It is pretty certain that a living specimen was about the same time exhibited in England. Sir Hamon L'Estrange tells us distinctly that hesawit. His original MS. is preserved in the British Museum, and with some blanks caused by the injury of time, of no great consequence, reads as follows:—

"About 1638, as I walked London streets, I saw the picture of a strange fowl hong out upon a cloth. vas and myselfe with one or two more Gen. in company went in to see it. It was kept in a chamber, and was a greate fowle somewhat bigger than the largest Turky Cock and so legged and footed but stouter and thicker and of a more erect shape, coloured before like the breast of a yong Cock Fesan and on the back of dunn or deare coulour. The keeper called it a Dodo and in the ende of a chimney in the chamber there lay an heap of large pebble stones whereof hee gave it many in our sight, some as bigg as nutmegs and the keeper told us shee eats them conducing to digestion and though I remember not how farre the keeper was questioned therein yet I am confident that afterwards shee cast them all agayne."[63]

It is probable that this very specimen passed into the museum of Tradescant, who, in the Catalogue of "The Collection of Rarities preserved at Lambeth," dated 1656, mentions the following: "Dodar from the Island Mauritius: it is not able to flie being so bigg." Willoughby the ornithologist, a most unexceptionable testimony, says that he saw this specimen in Tradescant's museum: it is mentioned also by others;—as by Llhwyd in 1684, and by Hyde in 1700. It passed, with the rest of the Tradescant Collection, to Oxford, and thus became part of the Ashmolean Museum,—and being in a decayed condition, was ordered to be destroyed by the authorities, who had no apprehension of its value, in 1755. The skull and one foot, however, were preserved, and are still in the Museum at Oxford. Remains of the Dodo have been dug up in the Mauritius, and are in the Paris Museum, and in that of the Zoological Society of London. The bird certainly does not exist there now, nor in either of the neighbouring islands.

In the British Museum there is a fine original painting, once the property of George Edwards, the celebrated bird painter, representing the Dodo surrounded by other minor birds and reptiles. Edwards states that "it was drawn in Holland, from a living bird brought from St Maurice's Island, in the East Indies. It was the property of Sir Hans Sloane at the time of his death, and afterwards becoming my property, I deposited it in the British Museum as a great curiosity."

Professor Owen has discovered another original figureof this interesting form in Savary's painting of "Orpheus and the Beasts," at the Hague. The figure, though small, displays all the characteristic peculiarities, and agrees well with Edwards' painting, while evincing that it was copied from the living bird.

It is possible that there were two species of Dodo; which would explain certain discrepancies in the descriptions of observers. At all events we have here one, if not more, conspicuous animal absolutely extinguished within the last two hundred years.

Just about a century ago a great animal disappeared from the ocean, which, according to Owen, was contemporary with the fossil elephant and rhinoceros of Siberia and England. Steller, a Russian voyager and naturalist, discovered the creature, afterward calledStelleriaby Cuvier, in Behring's Straits; a huge, unwieldy whale-like animal, one of the marine pachyderms, allied to the Manatee, but much larger, being twenty-five feet long, and twenty in circumference. Its flesh was good for food, and from its inertness and incapacity for defence, the race was extirpated in a few years. Steller first discovered the species in 1741, and the last known specimen was killed in 1768. It is believed to be quite extinct, as it has never been met with since.

Nearly a century ago, Sonnerat found in Madagascar, a curious animal, (Cheiromys,) which in structure seems to connect the monkeys with the squirrels. So rare was it there that even the natives viewed it with curiosity as an animal altogether unknown to them; and, from theirexclamations of astonishment rather than from its cry, the French naturalist is said to have conferred upon it the name of Aye-aye, by which it is now known.Not a specimen, as I believe, has been seen since Sonnerat's day, so that, if not actually obliterated, the species must be on the verge of extinction.

Species are dying out in our own day. I have already cited the interesting case of the Moho, that fine Gallinule of New Zealand, of which a specimen—probably the last of its race,—was obtained by Mr Walter Mantell; and that of the Káureke, the badger-like quadruped of the same islands, which was formerly domesticated by the Maoris, but which now cannot be found.

The Samoa Isles in the Pacific recently possessed a large and handsome kind of pigeon, of richly-coloured plumage, which the natives calledManu-mea, but to which modern naturalists have given the name ofDidunculus strigirostris. It was, both by structure and habit, essentially a ground pigeon, but not so exclusively but that it fed, and roosted too, according to Lieut. Walpole, among the branches of tall trees. Mr T. Peale, the naturalist of the U. S. Exploring Expedition, who first described it, informs us that according to the tradition of the natives, it once abounded; but some years ago these persons, like more civilised folks, had a strong desire to make pets of cats, and found, by means of whale-ships, opportunities of procuring a supply; but the consequence of the introduction of "pussy,"—for under this familiar old-country title were the exotic tabbies introduced—was the rapiddiminution of the handsomeManu-mea. Pussy did not fancy yams and taro—the vegetable diet on which the natives regaled—and took to the woods and mountains to search for something better. There she met with the feeble-wingedDidunculusscratching the soft earth for seeds, and with a purr and a mew soon scraped acquaintance with the stranger. Pussy declared she loved him well, and so she did—too well, in fact; she felt "as if she could eat him up,"—and did. The news soon spread among the tabbies that there were sweet birds in the woods, and the result is the almost total disappearance of poorManu-mea. Like the Dodo, it has ceased to be, but at the hand of a more ignominious foe. The Samoan may truly say to his former pet, "Cecidisti, O Manu-mea, non manu meâ, sed ungue felino." So rare had the bird become, that during the stay of the Expedition only three specimens could be procured, and of these two were lost by shipwreck. I do not know whether another has been met with since. Probably they are all gone; for that was twenty years ago.

When Norfolk Island,—that tiny spot in the Southern Ocean since so stained with human crime and misery—was first discovered, its tall and teeming forests were tenanted by a remarkable Parrot with a very long and slender hooked beak, which lived upon the honey of flowers. It was namedNestor productus. When Mr Gould visited Australia in his researches into the ornithology of those antipodeal regions, he found the Nestor Parrot absolutely limited to Philip Island, a tiny satellite of Norfolk Island, whose whole circumference is not morethan five miles in extent. The war of extermination had been so successful in the larger island that, with the exception of a few specimens preserved in cages, not one was believed to survive. Since then its last retreat has been harried, and Mr J. H. Gurney thus writes the dirge of the last of the Nestors:—

"I have seen the man who exterminated theNestor productusfrom Philip Island, he having shot the last of that species left on the island; he informs me that they rarely made use of their wings, except when closely pressed; their mode of progression was by the upper mandible; and whenever he used to go to the island to shoot, he would invariably find them on the ground, except one, which used to be sentry on one of the lower branches of theAraucaria excelsa, and the instant any person landed, they would run to those trees and haul themselves up by the bill, and, as a matter of course, they would there remain till they were shot, or the intruder had left the island. He likewise informed me that there was a large species of hawk that used to commit great havoc amongst them, but what species it was he could not tell me."[64]

I have before mentioned that Professor Owen had recognised the species in fossil skulls from New Zealand, associated with remains ofDinornis,Palapteryx, andNotornis. Thus it appears that the long-billed Parrot is an ancient race, whose extreme decrepitude has just survived to our time;—that it first became extinct from NewZealand, then from Norfolk Island, and lastly from Philip Island. Peace to its ashes!

Mr Yarrell, in his "History of British Birds,"[65]commences his account of one of them in these words:—"The Great Auk is a very rare British Bird, and but few instances are recorded of its capture. The natives in the Orkneys informed Mr Bullock, on his tour through these islands several years ago, that only one male had made its appearance for a long time, which had regularly visited Papa Westra for several seasons. The female, which the natives call the queen of the Auks, was killed just before Mr Bullock's arrival. The king or male, Mr Bullock had the pleasure of chasing for several hours in a six-oared boat, but without being able to kill him, for though he frequently got near him, so expert was the bird in its natural element that it appeared impossible to shoot him. The rapidity with which he pursued his course under water was almost incredible. About a fortnight after Mr Bullock had left Papa Westra, this male bird was obtained and sent him, and at the sale of his collection, was purchased for the British Museum, where it is still carefully preserved."

This fine bird, which was larger than a goose, is believed to be extinct. Mr Bullock's specimen was taken in 1812; another was captured at St Kilda in 1822, another was picked up dead near Lundy Island in 1829, and yet another was taken in 1834, off the coast of Waterford.

On the north coast of Europe the bird is equally rare;not more than two or three, at the utmost, having been procured during the present century. During that period, however, it has haunted one or two breeding-rocks on the south coast of Iceland, in some abundance. In the years 1830 and 1831, as many as twenty-seven were obtained there, and from that time till 1840, about ten more. The last birds obtained on the Iceland coast were a pair, which were shot on their nest in 1844. The last taken in any locality, so far as is known, was one shot in 1848, by a peasant, on the Island of Wardoe, within the Arctic Circle.

Two centuries ago, the Great Auk was not uncommon on the shores of New England; and, off the great fishing-banks of Newfoundland, it appears to have been very abundant. "Its appearance was always hailed by the mariner approaching that desolate coast as the first indication of his having reached soundings on the fishing-banks. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries these waters, as well as the Iceland and Faroe coasts, were annually visited by hundreds of ships from England, France, Spain, Holland, and Portugal; and these ships actually were accustomed to provision themselves with the bodies and eggs of these birds, which they found breeding in myriads on the low islands off the coast of Newfoundland. Besides the fresh birds consumed by the ship's crew, many tons were salted down for further use. In the space of an hour, these old voyagers tell us, they could fill thirty boats with the birds. It was only necessary to go on shore, armed with sticks to kill as manyas they chose. The birds were so stupid that they allowed themselves to be taken up, on their own proper element, by boats under sail; and it is even said that on putting out a plank it was possible to drive the Great Auks up and out of the sea into boats. On land the sailors formed low enclosures of stones, into which they drove the Penguins [or Auks], and, as they were unable to fly, kept them there enclosed till they were wanted for the table."

"In 1841, a distinguished Norwegian naturalist, (too early, alas! lost to science,) Peter Stuwitz, visited Tunk Island, or Penguin Island, lying to the east of Newfoundland. Here, on the north-west shore of the island, he found enormous heaps of bones and skeletons of the Great Auk, lying either in exposed masses or slightly covered by the earth. On this side of the island the rocks slope gradually down to the shore; and here were still standing the stone fences and enclosures into which the birds were driven for slaughter."[66]

It is just possible that the bird may yet haunt the inaccessible coast of East Greenland, but ships sailing between that country and Iceland never meet with it at sea. Nor did Graah observe it during his toilsome researches east of Cape Farewell. The numerous fishing craft that every season crowd the shores of Newfoundland and Labrador forbid the notion that it yet lingers there; for the great market-value set upon the bird and its eggs for collections would prevent its existence there from being overlooked. The numerous Polar voyages of discovery, and the annual fleets of whalers, would certainly have discovered it, if it still haunted the more northern regions. It is possible that a few isolated individuals may still survive; but it is the habit of the bird, as of most sea-fowl, to breed in society in bare seaward rocks, and the circumstance that no breeding station is known to be now frequented by the Great Auk renders it but too probable that it also must be classed among the species that were.

The interest attached to this now extinct bird has induced some correspondents of theZoologistto attempt an enumeration of the specimens, both of the bird and of its eggs, (which from their great size, as well as from their rarity, have always had a value with collectors,) known to be preserved in cabinets. The result is that English collections contain 14 birds and 23 eggs; those of continental Europe, 11 birds and 20 eggs; the United States, 1 bird and 2 eggs:—the total being 26 birds and 45 eggs.

It would appear that the rock off the south of Iceland which was the chief breeding resort of the Great Auk, and which from that circumstance bore the name or "Geir-fulga Sker," sank to the level of the sea during a volcanic disturbance in or about the year 1830. "Such disappearance of the fit and favourable breeding-places of theAlca impennis," observes Professor Owen, "must form an important element in its decline towards extinction." One might think that there would be rocks enough left for the birds to choose a fresh station; butreally we do not know what are the elements of choice in such a case: some peculiarities exist which make one particular rock to be selected by sea-fowl, when others apparently to us as suitable are quite neglected; but we do not know what they are. Possibly when Geir-fulga Sker sank, there was no other islet fit to supply the blank. Possibly, too, the submersion took place during the breeding season, drowning the eggs or young. If this was the case, it would indeed be "a heavy blow and great discouragement" to the dwindling Alcine nation.

Mr Darwin speaks of a large wolf-like Fox (Canis antarcticus) which at the time of his voyage was common to both the Falkland Islands, but absolutely confined to them. He says, "As far as I am aware, there is no other instance in any part of the world, of so small a mass of broken land, distant from a continent, possessing so large an aboriginal quadruped peculiar to itself. Their numbers have rapidly decreased; they are already banished from that half of the island which lies to the eastward of the neck of land between St Salvador Bay and Berkeley Sound. Within a very few years after these islands shall have become regularly settled, in all probability this fox will be classed with the Dodo, as an animal which has perished from the face of the earth."[67]

The Musk Ox (Ovibos moschatus), a long-haired ruminant, resembling what you would suppose a cross between a bull and a sheep might be,—formerly an inhabitant of Britain with the Elephant and the Hyena, but now foundonly on the polar margins of North America,—is becoming very scarce; and it is probable that before long its last representative will leave its bones with those of the lamented Franklin and his companions.

From the more perishable character of vegetable tissues we have far less data for determining the extinction of plant species; but analogy renders it highly probable that these also have died out, and are dying in a corresponding ratio with animals. I am not aware that a single example can be adduced of a plant that has certainly ceased to exist during the historic era. But Humboldt mentions a very remarkable tree in Mexico, of which it is believed only a single specimen remains in a state of nature. It is the Hand-tree (Cheirostemon platanoides), a sterculaceous plant with large plane-like leaves, and with the anthers connected together in such a manner as to resemble a hand or claw rising from the beautiful purplish-red blossoms. "There is in all the Mexican free States only one individual remaining, one single primeval stem of this wonderful genus. It is supposed not to be indigenous, but to have been planted by a king of Toluca about five hundred years ago. I found that the spot where the Arbol de las Manitas stands is 8825 feet above the level of the sea. Why is there only one tree of the kind? Whence did the kings of Toluca obtain the young tree, or the seed? It is equally enigmatical that Montezuma should not have possessed one of these trees in his botanical gardens of Huaxtepec, Chapoltepec, and Iztapalapan, which were used as late as by Philip the Second'sphysician, Hernandez, and of which gardens traces still remain; and it appears no less striking that the Hand-tree should not have found a place among the drawings of subjects connected with Natural History, which Nezahual Coyotl, king of Tezcuco, caused to be made half a century before the arrival of the Spaniards."

There is an example of this interesting plant growing in one of the conservatories at Kew, but I do not know whence it was obtained. It has been asserted that it grows wild in the forests of Guatemala.

Leaving plants out of consideration from lack of adequate data, we find that a considerable number of species of animals have certainly ceased to exist since man inhabited the globe. There have been, doubtless, many others that have shared the same fate, which we know nothing about. It is only within the last hundred years that we have had anything approaching to an acquaintance with the living fauna of the earth; yet, during that time some seven or eight creatures we know have been extinguished. Fully half of these,—the Auk, the Didunculus, the Notornis, and the Nestor,—within the last ten years! It would really seem as if the more complete and comprehensive an acquaintance with the animals of the world became, the more frequently this strange phenomenon of expiring species was presented to us. Perhaps it is not extravagant to suppose that—including all the invertebrate animals, the countless hosts of insects, and all the recondite forms that dwell in the recesses of the ocean—a species fades from existence every year. All the examplesthat have been given were either Mammalia or Birds, (the Colossochelysonly excepted:) now these, though the most conspicuous and best known, are almost the least populous classes of living beings. There is no reason whatever for concluding that the law of mortality of species does not extend to all the other classes, vertebrate and invertebrate, in an equal ratio, so that my estimate will appear, I think, a very moderate one. Yet it is a startling thought, and one which the mind does not entertain without a measure of revulsion, that the passing of every century in the world's history has left its faunaminusa hundred species of animals that were denizens of the earth when it began. I was going to say "left the fauna so muchpoorer;" but that I am not sure of. The term would imply that the blanks are not filled up; and that, I repeat, I am not sure of. Probability would suggest that new forms are continually created to supply the lack of deceased ones; and it may be thatsome, at least, of the creatures ever and anon described as new to science, especially in old and well-searched regions, may be newly called into being, as well as newly discovered. It may be so, I say; I have no evidence that it is so, except the probability of analogy; we know that the rate of mortality amongindividualsof a species, speaking generally, is equalled by the rate of birth, and we may suppose this balance of life to be paralleled when the unit is a species, and not an individual. If the Word of God contained anything either in statement or principle contrary to such a supposition, I would not entertain it for a moment, butI do not know that it does. I do not know that it is anywhere implied that God created no more after the six days' work was done. His Sabbath-rest having been broken by the incoming of sin, we know from John v. 17, that He continued to work without interruption; and we may fairly conclude that progressive creation was included as a part of that unceasing work.

I know not whether my readers will take the same concern as I do in this subject of the dying-out of species, but to me it possesses a very peculiar interest. Death is a mysterious event, come when and how it will; and surely the departure from existence of a species, of a type of being, that has subsisted in contemporary thousands of individuals, for thousands of years, is not less imposingly mysterious than that of the individual exemplar.

We do not know with any precision what are the immediate causes of death in a species. Is there a definite limit to life imposed at first? or is this limit left, so to speak, to be determined by accidental circumstances? Perhaps both: but if the latter, what are those circumstances?

Professor Owen says:—"There are characters in land animals rendering them more obnoxious to extirpating influences, which may explain why so many of the larger species of particular groups have become extinct, whilst smaller species of equal antiquity have survived. In proportion to its bulk is the difficulty of the contest which the animal has to maintain against the surrounding agencies that are ever tending to dissolve the vital bond, andsubjugate the living matter to the ordinary chemical and physical forces. Any changes, therefore, in such external agencies as a species may have been originally adapted to exist in, will militate against that existence in a degree proportionate to the size which may characterise the species. If a dry season be gradually prolonged, the large mammal will suffer from the drought sooner than the small one; if such alteration of climate affect the quantity of vegetable food, the bulky herbivore will first feel the effects of stinted nourishment; if new enemies be introduced, the large and conspicuous animal will fall a prey while the smaller kinds conceal themselves and escape. Small quadrupeds, moreover, are more prolific than large ones. Those of the bulk of the mastodons, megatheria, glyptodons, and diprotodons, are uniparous. The actual presence, therefore, of small species of animals in countries where larger species of the same natural families formerly existed, is not the consequence of degeneration—of any gradual diminution of the size—of such species, but is the result of circumstances which may be illustrated by the fable of 'the Oak and the Reed;' the smaller and feebler animals have bent and accommodated themselves to changes to which the larger species have succumbed."[68]

"We do not steadily bear in mind," remarks Mr Darwin, "how profoundly ignorant we are of the condition of existence of every animal; nor do we always remember that some check is constantly preventing the too rapidincrease of every organised being left in a state of nature. The supply of food, on an average, remains constant; yet the tendency in every animal to increase by propagation is geometrical; and its surprising effects have nowhere been more astonishingly shewn, than in the case of the European animals run wild during the last few centuries in America. Every animal in a state of nature regularly breeds; yet in a species long established, anygreatincrease in numbers is obviously impossible, and must be checked by some means. We are nevertheless seldom able with certainty to tell in any given species, at what period of life, or at what period of the year, or whether only at long intervals, the check falls; or again, what is the precise nature of the check. Hence probably it is, that we feel so little surprise at one, of two species closely allied in habits, being rare and the other abundant in the same district; or again, that one should be abundant in one district, and another, filling the same place in the economy of nature, should be abundant in a neighbouring district, differing very little in its conditions. If asked how this is, one immediately replies that it is determined by some slight difference in climate, food, or the number of enemies: yet how rarely, if ever, we can point out the precise cause and manner of action of the check! We are, therefore, driven to the conclusion that causes generally quite inappreciable by us, determine whether a given species shall be abundant or scanty in numbers.

"In the cases where we can trace the extinction of a species through man, either wholly or in one limited district, we know that it becomes rarer and rarer, and is then lost; it would be difficult to point out any just distinction between a species destroyed by man or by the increase of its natural enemies. The evidence of rarity preceding extinction, is more striking in the successive tertiary strata, as remarked by several able observers; it has often been found that a shell very common in a tertiary stratum is now most rare, and has even long been thought to be extinct. If, then, as appears probable, species first become rare and then extinct—if the too rapid increase of every species, even the most favoured, is steadily checked, as we must admit, though how and when it is hard to say—and if we see, without the smallest surprise, though unable to assign the precise reason, one species abundant, and another closely-allied species rare in the same district—why should we feel such great astonishment at the rarity being carried a step further to extinction? An action going on, on every side of us, and yet barely appreciable, might surely be carried a little further, without exciting our observation. Who could feel any great surprise at hearing that the Megalonyx was formerly rare compared with the Megatherium, or that one of the fossil Monkeys was few in number compared with one of the now living Monkeys? and yet, in this comparative rarity, we should have the plainest evidence of less favourable conditions for their existence. To admit that species generally become rare before they become extinct—to feel no surprise at the comparative rarity of one species with another, and yet to call in some extraordinary agent and to marvel greatlywhen a species ceases to exist, appears to me much the same as to admit that sickness in the individual is the prelude of death—to feel no surprise at sickness—but when the sick man dies to wonder, and to believe that he died through violence."[69]

Geographical distribution is an important element in this question of extinction. A species that is spread over a wide region is far more likely to survive than one which is confined to a limited district; and extraneous influences acting prejudicially will exterminate a species which is confined to an island much sooner than if it had a continent to retire upon. We have seen how theNestorParrot became extinct in New Zealand, while it survived in Norfolk Island, because the former was colonised by the Maori race, while the latter remained in its virginity. But how quickly did the poor Parrot succumb as soon as man set his foot on Norfolk and Philip Islands! And how brief was the lease of life accorded to theDidunculus, when once the "Pussies" found their way to the little Samoa isles!

Very many islands have a fauna that is to a great extent peculiar to themselves. I know that, in Jamaica, the Humming-birds, some of the Parrots, some of the Cuckoos, most of the Pigeons, many of the smaller birds, and, I think, all of the Reptiles, are found nowhere else. Nay, more, that even the smaller islands of the Antilles have each a fauna of its own, unshared with any other land;—its own Humming-birds, its own Lizards andSnakes; its own Butterflies and Beetles, its own Spiders, its own Snails, its own Worms. How likely are some of these very limited species to become extinguished! By the increasing aggressions of clearing and cultivating man; by slight changes of level; even by electric and meteoric phenomena acting very locally. I find that, in Jamaica, many of the animals peculiar to the island are not spread over the whole surface, limited as that is, but are confined to a single small district. In some cases, the individuals are but few, even in that favoured locality; how easily we may conceive of a season drier than ordinary, or wetter than ordinary, or a flood, or a hurricane of unusual violence, or a volcanic eruption, either killing outright these few individuals, or destroying their means of living, and so indirectly destroying them by starvation. And then the species has disappeared!

The common Red Grouse, so abundantly seen during the season hanging at every poulterer's and game-dealer's shop in London, is absolutely unknown out of the British Isles. It could not live except in wide, unenclosed, uncultivated districts; so that when the period arrives that the whole of British land is enclosed and brought under cultivation, the Grouse's lease of life will expire. We owe it to our hard-worked members of Parliament to hope that this condition of things may be distant.

The vulgar mind is very prone to love the marvellous, and to count for a prodigy every unusual phenomenon, every occurrence not perfectly accountable on any hypothesis which is familiar to them. The poetical period of history in every country is full of prodigies; for in the dawn of civilisation the physical laws of nature are little understood, and multitudes of natural phenomena are either referred to false causes, or, being unreferrible to any recognised cause, are set down as mere wonders. It is the province of science to dispel these delusions, to expose the undiscovered, but by no means undiscoverable, origins of unusual events, and thus to be continually narrowing the limits of the unknown. These limits, however, have not even yet quite reached the minuteness of a mathematical point; and there are a few marvels left for the indefatigable rummagings of modern science to explain.

Perhaps the predominant tendency of uneducated minds in the present day is rather to attribute effects tofalsecauses, than to leave them without any assignable cause. It is much easier for an unreasoning person to say that Tenterden steeple is the cause of Goodwin Sands, than to leave Goodwin Sands quite unaccounted for; or to say,the plant-lice suddenly appear crowding the rose-twigs, "the east wind has cast a blight," or "it is something in the air," than "I do not know how to account for their appearance." To a reflecting person, indeed, who weighs forces, the east wind appears as incompetent to the production of living animals as the tall tower to the origination of a sand-bank; and this, though he might be able to suggest nothing a whit more competent. What should he do in such a case? Manifestly this—test the actual existence and conditions of the phenomenon; see that it really has occurred; and, if the fact cannot be denied, admit it as a fact, and wait further light as to its causation.

I do not by any means presume to declare the universal "why and because" of every familiar or unfamiliar occurrence: I leave that to more pretentious philosophers; smiling occasionally in my sleeve at the egotism which cannot see its ownnon-sequiturs. But still less can I consent to set aside every phenomenon which I cannot explain, with the common resource,—"Pooh! pooh! there must be some mistake!" Rather would I say, "There must still be some ignorance in me: near as I have reached to the summit of the ladder of knowledge, there must be still one or two rongs to be mounted before I can proclaim my mastery of all, absolutelyall, the occult causes of things. Therefore, till then I must be content with the lowlier task of patiently accumulating evidence."

At various times and in various places popular superstition has been excited by the occurrence of what have been called showers of blood. The destruction of cities and of kingdoms has been, according to historians, preceded by this awful omen. Yet this has been explained by a very natural and accountable phenomenon. In the year 1553, the hedges and trees, the stones of the pathway, and the clothes of many persons, were sprinkled copiously with drops of red fluid, which was supposed to be blood, till some observant person noticed the coincident appearance of unusual swarms of butterflies, and marked that the coloured drops proceeded from them. Again, at Aix la Chapelle in 1608, the same awful appearance occurred, especially on the walls of a particular churchyard. M. Peiresc, an able naturalist, residing at Aix, traced the phenomenon here to the same cause. Just before, he had found a large chrysalis, which he had enclosed in a box, in order to identify the species to which it belonged. A few days after, hearing a rustling, he opened the box, and discovered a beautiful butterfly evolved from the pupa, which had left upon the floor of its prison a large red stain. He saw that the character of this deposit agreed exactly with that of the ominous drops abroad, and remarking an unusual abundance of the same kind of butterfly, he conceived that he had revealed the cause of the terrific phenomenon. He was confirmed in this belief by the circumstance that the supposed blood-drops were not found in the streets of the town, nor upon the roofs of the houses, where they must have occurred had they fallen from the sky; and, moreover, that it was rare to seeany on the exposed parts of stones, walls, &c.; but rather under the protection of angles, and in slight cavities—which agrees well with the habits of the insects in question. No doubt this was the true explanation of the phenomenon, but it does not say much for the powers of observation which could have attributed it to blood, for the colour is by no means that of blood, especiallydriedblood, but much more crimson; and the earthy deposit, resembling chalk, which copiously remains after the fluid part has evaporated, would in a moment convince any one who was in the habit of comparing things which differ, that, whatever the substance was, blood it certainly was not.

I myself not long ago met with an appearance which bore a much closer resemblance to drops of blood than this, and which yet was referrible to a widely different origin. In the neighbourhood of Ashburton, in Devon, a quarter of a mile or so from the town, there is a shallow horse-pond, the bottom of which consists of an impalpable whitish mud, much indented with hoof-holes and other irregularities. In these, the water being dimly clear from settlement, I observed what looked exactly like blood, in numerous patches, the appearance being as if two or three drops of blood had fallen in one spot, half-a-dozen in another, and so on. The colour was true, and even when I alighted, and looked carefully on the spots, they had just that curdled appearance that drops of blood assume when they fall into still water. But there appeared on minute examination a constant intestine motion in each spot, which caused me to bring my eye closer, when Idiscovered that I had been egregiously deceived. Each apparent drop of blood was formed of a number of slender worms, about as thick as a hog's bristle, and an inch and a half long, of a red hue, which protruded the greater part of their length from the mud, in a radiating form, each maintaining a constant undulatory movement. There were more or fewer centres of radiation, the circles frequently interrupted by, and merging into, others, just as drops of blood crowded together would do. On the slightest disturbance the little actors shrank out of sight into the soft mud; but by scooping up a little of this I contrived to get a number of them into a phial, which, as the sediment settled, were seen at the bottom playing as if in their pond. On examination of the specimens with a microscope I found them to be minute Annelids, such as I have described, apparently of the genusLumbriculusof Grube, with two rows of bristle-pencils, and two bristles in a pencil. The body was transparent and colourless, and the red hue was given by the great and conspicuous longitudinal blood-vessels, and by the lateral connecting vessels, which viewed sidewise took the form of loops. The animals soon died in captivity, but I kept some for three or four days alive.

I have elsewhere referred to the curious phenomenon of crimson snow, and to the uncertainty which still hangs over its cause. I have lately met with another explanation, which seems sufficiently guaranteed to be depended on, though, as the red snow occurs in places where this cause cannot operate, it only shews that similar resultsmay be produced by diverse agencies. A certain resemblance between the facts and those adduced by M. Peiresc will warrant my quoting them. Mr Thomas Nicholson, in a visit to Sowallik Point, in Prince Regent's Inlet, thus describes what he saw:—"The summit of the hill forming the point is covered with huge masses of granite, while the side, which forms a gentle declivity towards the bay, was covered with crimson snow. It was evident, at first view, that this colour was imparted to the snow by a substance lying on the surface. This substance lay scattered here and there in small masses bearing some resemblance to powdered cochineal, surrounded by a lighter shade, which was produced by the colouring matter being partly dissolved and diffused by the deliquescent snow. During this examination our hats and upper garments were observed to be daubed with a substance of a similar red colour; and a moment's reflection convinced us that this was the excrement of the little Auk, myriads of which bird were continually flying over our heads, having their nests among the loose masses of granite. A ready explanation of the origin of the red snow was now presented to us, and not a doubt remained in the mind of any of us that this was the correct one. The snow on the mountains of higher elevation than the nests of these birds was perfectly white; and a ravine at a short distance, which was filled with snow from top to bottom, but which afforded no hiding-place for these birds to form their nests, presented an appearance uniformly white."[70]

After all, however, realbonâ fiderain does sometimes descend, which, if not blood-red, is at least red. "M. Giovanni Campani, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Siena, has just published a letter, addressed to Professor Matteucci, on a most singular phenomenon which occurred at Siena in December last. On the 28th of that month, about sevenA.M., the inhabitants of the northwestern part of the city witnessed with surprise the curious phenomenon of a copious fall of rain of a reddish hue, which lasted two hours; a second shower of the same colour occurred at elevenA.M., and a third at twoP.M., but that of the deepest red fell the first time. But what adds to the strangeness of the occurrence is that it was entirely confined to that particular quarter of the town, and so nicely was the line drawn that the cessation of the red colour was ascertained in one direction to be at about two hundred mètres from the meteorological observatory, the pluviometer of which received colourless rain at exactly the same time. The temperature during the same interval varied between 8 deg. and 10 deg. Centigrade (46 and 50 Fahrenheit). The wind blew from the S.W. at the beginning of the phenomenon, and afterwards changed to W.S.W. None of the rural population in the immediate vicinity of Siena remarked the occurrence, so that most probably the rain that fell round the town was colourless. The same phenomenon, strange to say, recurred in exactly the same quarter of the town on the 31st of December, and again on the 1st of January, the wind being W.N.W., and the temperature respectively 35 and 39·42 deg.,Fahrenheit. Each time, however, the red colour diminished in depth, its greatest strength having at no time exceeded that of weak wine and water. A similar occurrence is recorded as having taken place in 1819 at Blankenburg, when MM. Meyer and Stopp found the water to contain a solution of chloride of cobalt. Professor Campani, who is now engaged, in conjunction with his colleague, Professor Gabrielli, in analyzing the red water collected, has ascertained that in this instance it contains no chloride of cobalt, and, moreover, that the colour must be owing to some solution, since the water has deposited no sediment."[71]

The occasional occurrence of large masses of water stained of a vivid red hue, and for the most part suddenly, and without any ostensible cause, has not unreasonably been recorded as a prodigy, rivalling one of the plagues of Egypt—the turning of the waters into blood.

"I remember," says Mr Latrobe, "the report reaching Neufchatel, through the medium of the market-people passing from the one lake to the other, (some time during the winter,) that the waters of the lake of Morat had suddenly become the colour of blood, though I could meet with no one whose testimony was sufficiently clear and unequivocal to establish the fact. This, joined to my not having the leisure then to go and see for myself, caused the matter to slip from my memory entirely, till I found myself in the neighbourhood. Here the circumstance was fully confirmed to me in a manner not to be questioned; and having since met with a paper, written by M. de Candolle, of Geneva, on the subject, I shall take what is there stated as my best guide in mentioning the facts as they occurred:—

"It appears that this singular phenomenon began to excite the attention of the inhabitants of Morat as early as November last year, and that it continued more or less observable during the whole of the winter.

"Mr Trechsel, a gentleman resident at Morat, to whom M. de Candolle applied, on hearing the report, for information and specimens of the colouring matter, stated—That during the early hours of the day no extraordinary appearance was observable in the lake; but that a little later, long parallel lines of reddish matter were seen to extend along the surface of the water, at some short distance from the banks. This, being blown by the wind towards the more sheltered parts of the shore, collected itself about the reeds and rushes, covering the surface of the lake with a light foam; forming as it were different strata of various colours, from greenish black, grey, yellow, and brown, to the most delicious red. He adds, that this matter exhaled a pestiferous odour during the day, but disappeared at the approach of night. It was further observed, that during tempestuous weather it vanished altogether. Many small fishes were seen to become intoxicated while swimming amongst it, and after a few convulsive leaps, to lie motionless on the surface.

"The naturalists of Geneva decided, from the specimenssent, that it was an animal substance, which, if not theOscillatoria subfusca,[72]was nearly allied to it.

"Soon after the beginning of May it disappeared entirely. It is not known that this phenomenon has appeared before in the lake of Morat within the memory of man. Tradition states the same to have happened the year preceding the great battle."[73]

A few years ago, in one of my tanks of sea-water, there occurred a phenomenon much like this. Patches of a rich crimson-purple colour formed here and there on the surface, which rapidly grew on all sides till they coalesced. If allowed to be a few days undisturbed, the entire surface of the water became covered with a pellicle of the substance, which spread also over the stones and shells of the bottom, and the sides of the vessel. It could be lifted in impalpable laminæ on sheets of paper. I found it difficult to keep it within bounds, and impossible to get quite rid of it, till, after some months, I lost it by the accidental breaking of the vessel. Under the microscope, this proved anOscillatoria, which I could not identify with any of the described species in Harvey'sPhytologia: the filaments creeping and twining with the peculiar vermicular movements of the genus.

Blood-like waters are sometimes produced by a rapid evolution of infusorial animalcules. Of these the most effective areAstasia hæmatodes, andEuglena sanguinea;both of them minute spindle-shaped creatures of a pulpy substance, and sanguine hue. They are produced occasionally in incalculable numbers, increasing with vast rapidity by means of spontaneous division. Ehrenberg suggests that the miracle of blood-change performed on the Nile and on all other collections of water in Egypt by Moses (Exod. vii. 17-25) may have been effected by the agency of these animalcules. Of course it would require Divine power as much to educe uncounted millions of animalcules at the word of command, as to form real blood, so that no escape from the presence of Deity would be gained by admitting the supposition; but the words of the inspired narrative seem to render it untenable.

To return to showers. "If it should rain cats and dogs,"—is a phrase which is in many mouths; but probably no one has heard it transferred from the subjunctive to the indicative mood. Why not, however, if it rains snails, frogs, fishes, and feathers? That these animals and animal products are really poured down from the atmosphere, I can adduce some evidence; the value of which my readers may weigh when they have heard the pleadings.

In that venerable newspaper,Felix Farley's Journal, for July 1821, there was "an account of a wonderful quantity of snail-shells found in a piece of land of several acres near Bristol, that common report says fell in a shower." This shell-storm attracting much attention at the time, Mr Wm. Baker, of Bridgewater, asked information from the Curator of the Bristol Institution, who thuscleared up the mystery:—"The periwinkles are indeed wonderful. They descended, forsooth, in a heavy rain-like shower on the field of Mr Peach, as a due punishment for his disrespect to the virtues of our late queen. The shower was so intense, that the umbrella of an old lady passing by was broken to pieces, and the fragments lifted in the air by the whirlwind, which picked up all the periwinkles on the neighbouring hills, and dropped them three inches thick on Mr Peach's field! But you know the story of 'The Three Black Crows;' and thus the whole is reduced to no periwinkle rain, no whirlwind; but turns out to be our old friendHelix virgata, making its annual pilgrimage in search of a mate, and occurring one in almost every square inch in the field in question."

Provincial newspapers seem to have a special power of reporting such natural history facts, which rarely survive investigation. TheStroud Free Press, for May 23, 1851, tells us that "an extraordinary scene was witnessed at Bradford, about twelve miles from Bristol, on Saturday week, when that village was visited by a heavy shower of snails. They might have been gathered by bushels." Mr J. W. Douglas, the eminent entomologist, immediately asked some pertinent questions anent the shower; but whether it was that the witnesses were grieved at his profanely comparing such prodigies to Professors Morison and Holloway's cures, or whether they had no more definite intelligence to communicate,certesecho answered not.

We fear we must give up snails. But frogs! everybody knows that toads and frogs fall from the sky. Accordingto travellers in tropical America, the inhabitants of Portobello assert that every drop of rain is changed into a toad; the more instructed, however, believe that the spawn of these animals is raised with the vapour from the adjoining swamps, and being driven in the clouds over the city, the ova are hatched as they descend in rain. 'Tis certain that the streets after a night of heavy rain are almost covered with the ill-favoured reptiles, and it is impossible to walk without crushing them.[74]But heretic philosophers point to the mature growth of the vermin, many of them being six inches in length, and maintain that the clever hypothesis just mentioned will scarcely account for the appearance of these.

In theLeeds Mercuryfor June 1844, there occurred the following statement:—"In the course of the afternoon of Monday last, during the prevalence of rather heavy rain, the good people of Selby were astonished at a remarkable phenomenon. It was rendered forcibly apparent, that, with the descent of the rain, there was a shower of another description, viz. a shower of frogs. The truth of this was rendered more manifest by the circumstance that several of the frogs were caught in their descent by holding out hats for that purpose. They were about the size of a horse-bean, and remarkably lively after their aerial but wingless flight. The same phenomenon was observed in the immediate neighbourhood."

The editor of theZoologistimmediately asked for confirmation of the stated facts, from resident persons ofscience; but notwithstanding the circumstantiality of the account, and especially the reported actual capture of the little sprawlers in hats, no one replied to the demand, and we are compelled to conclude that the report would not bear critical investigation.

Yet incredulity may be pushed too far even here. For, in the continental journals many more such statements occur than in those of this country, and some of them vouched by apparently indisputable authority. If my readers will refer toL'Institut.tom. ii. (1834) pp. 337, 346, 347, 353, 354, 386, 409; tom. iv. (1836) pp. 221, 314, 325; tom. vi. (1838) p. 212, they will find mention made of this phenomenon,—showers of toads. In two or three of these cases, the toads were not only observed in countless numbers on the ground, during, and after, heavy storms of rain, but were seen to strike upon the roofs of houses, bounding thence into the streets; they even fell upon the hats, umbrellas, and clothes of the observers, who were out in the storm, and, in one instance, were actually received into the outstretched hand.[75]

Much more recently, namely, early in 1859, the newspapers of South Wales recorded a shower of fish in the Valley of Aberdare. The repeated statements attracted more notice than usual, and the Rev. John Griffith, the vicar of the parish, communicated the following results of his inquiries to theEvening Mail:—

"Many of your readers might, perhaps, like to see thefacts connected with this phenomenon. They will be better understood in the words of the principal witness, as taken down by me on the spot where it happened. This man's name is John Lewis, a sawyer in Messrs Nixon and Co.'s yard. His evidence is as follows:—'On Wednesday, February 9, I was getting out a piece of timber for the purpose of setting it for the saw, when I was startled by something falling all over me—down my neck, on my head, and on my back. On putting my hand down my neck I was surprised to find they were little fish. By this time I saw the whole ground covered with them. I took off my hat, the brim of which was full of them. They were jumping all about. They covered the ground in a long strip of about eighty yards by twelve, as we measured afterwards. That shed (pointing to a very large workshop) was covered with them, and the shoots were quite full of them. My mates and I might have gathered bucketfuls of them, scraping with our hands. We did gather a great many, about a bucketful, and threw them into the rain-pool, where some of them now are. There were two showers, with an interval of about ten minutes, and each shower lasted about two minutes or thereabouts. The time was elevenA.M.The morning up-train to Aberdare was just then passing. It was not blowing very hard, but uncommon wet, just about the same wind as there is to-day (blowing rather stiff), and it came from this quarter (pointing to the S. of W.). They came down with the rain in "a body, like."' Such is the evidence. I have taken it for the purpose of being laid before Professor Owen, to whom, also, I shall send to-morrow, at the request of a friend of his, eighteen or twenty of the little fish. Three of them are large and very stout, measuring about four inches. The rest are small. There were some—but they are since dead—fully five inches long. They are very lively.—Your obedient servant,

"John Griffith,"Vicar of Aberdare and Rural Dean."Vicarage, Aberdare,March 8."

The specimens which were forwarded to Professor Owen were exhibited in a tank at the Zoological Gardens in the Regent's Park: they consisted of minnows (Leuciscus phoxinus) and Smooth-tailed sticklebacks (Gasterosteus leiurus.) Asavantthus endeavoured to "enlighten" the uninitiated on the matter:—"On reading the evidence it appears to me most probably only a practical joke of the mates of John Lewis, who seem to have thrown a pailful of water with the fish in it over him, and he appears to have returned them to the pool from which they were originally taken. The fish forwarded are very unlike those taken up in whirlwinds in tropical countries, and we must make allowance for unintentional exaggerations of quantity, &c., in an account given a month after the event had occurred."

This "appears to me" a beautiful example of critical acumen. My readers will do well to look at it for a moment; as they may thus learn how to sift the grain of truth out of the bushel of chaff.Reverentèr procedamus!

The main (is it not the only?) objection to the honest sawyer's statement is that "the fish are very unlike those taken up in whirlwinds in tropical countries." That is, that, seeing the phenomenon occurs in Great Britain, it is most unfortunate that the fishes are British species. Now, in India, when such things occur, it is alwaysIndianspecies that are taken up;ergo, it ought to be Indian specieshere. But these are "very unlike" the Indian fishes;ergo, it is manifestly a humbug.

Then, does it not strike one as palpably probable, when once one's dull intellect has been "enlightened" by the brilliant suggestion,—that the worthy sawyer who had a pail of water soused upon him, thought it was a heavy shower of rain?Veryheavy, no doubt; indeed he says it was "uncommon wet." To be sure, he thought there weretwoshowers, each lasting about two minutes, with an interval of ten minutes between them; but this little error might be easily made, for doubtless a bucket of water poured on one's head might well be equivalent to two showers of rain, or even ten, for that matter. To be sure, moreover, there was a considerable quantity of fish:—"The whole ground was covered with them: they were jumping all about: they covered the ground in a long strip of about eighty yards by twelve,as we measuredafterwards: the shed was covered with them, and the shoots were quite full of them.... My mates and I might have gathered bucketfuls of them: we did gather about a bucketful." Yes, yes: but all were originally in the pail of water thrown over you, John. How stupidyou were, not to perceivethat! How there was room for any water at all in the pail, seeing there were so many fish, you say you don't know; but that is your stupidity, John! Theremusthave been room for water, for it was "uncommon wet;" and the water was in the pail, for the Doctor says so. Uncommon fishy, too, I should think; but let that pass. Where the mates collected the pail of live fishes for their pleasant and profitable hoax, and how, and when,—the sceptic might wonderingly ask; but a hoax it was.Ipse dixit.

However, the verdict did not obtain universal assent; and an excellent and well-known naturalist, Mr Robert Drave, residing in the vicinity, ventured modestly to indicate a dissent. "I think actual fact will excuse the otherwise apparently unbecoming assumption in me, of opposing such high authority by a contrary opinion, for from informationobtained from many sources, and very careful and minuteinquiry, I am quite convinced that a great number of fish did actually descend with rainover a considerable tract of country. The specimens I obtainedfrom three individuals, resident some distance from each other, were of two species, the common minnow and the three-spined stickleback; the former most abundant, and mostly very small, though some had attained their full size."[76]

If now we look to other lands, we shall find that the descent of fishes from the atmosphere, under conditions little understood, is a phenomenon which rests on indubitable evidence. Humboldt has published interesting details of the ejection of fish in large quantities from volcanoes in South America. On the night between the 19th and 20th of June, 1698, the summit of Carguairazo, a volcano more than 19,000 feet in height, fell in, and all the surrounding country for nearly thirty-two square miles was covered with mud and fishes. A similar eruption of fish from the volcano of Imbaburu was supposed to have been the cause of a putrid fever which raged in the town of Ibarra seven years before that period.

These facts are not inexplicable. Subterraneous lakes, communicating with surface-waters, form in deep cavities in the declivities, or at the base of a volcano. In certain active stages of ignition, these internal cavities are burst open, and their contents discharged through the crater. Humboldt ascertained that the fishes in question belonged to a curious and ill-favoured species of theSiluridæ,—thePimelodes Cyclopum.

Back to Index Next