We accept the segregation of other objects raised in that whirlwind.
Then, near the place of origin, there would have been a fall of heavier
objects that had been snatched up with the snakes--stones, fence rails,
limbs of trees. Say that the snakes occupied the next gradation, and
would be the next to fall. Still farther would there have been separate
falls of lightest objects: leaves, twigs, tufts of grass.
In the _Monthly Weather Review_ there is no mention of other falls said
to have occurred anywhere in January, 1877.
Again ours is the objection against such selectiveness by a whirlwind.
Conceivably a whirlwind could scoop out a den of hibernating snakes,
with stones and earth and an infinitude of other debris, snatching up
dozens of snakes--I don't know how many to a den--hundreds maybe--but,
according to the account of this occurrence in the _New York Times_,
there were thousands of them; alive; from one foot to eighteen inches in
length. The _Scientific American_, 36-86, records the fall, and says
that there were thousands of them. The usual whirlwind-explanation is
given--"but in what locality snakes exist in such abundance is yet a
mystery."
This matter of enormousness of numbers suggests to me something of a
migratory nature--but that snakes in the United States do not migrate in
the month of January, if ever.
As to falls or flutterings of winged insects from the sky, prevailing
notions of swarming would seem explanatory enough: nevertheless, in
instances of ants, there are some peculiar circumstances.
_L'Astronomie_, 1889-353:
Fall of fishes, June 13, 1889, in Holland; ants, Aug. 1, 1889,
Strasbourg; little toads, Aug. 2, 1889, Savoy.
Fall of ants, Cambridge, England, summer of 1874--"some were wingless."
(_Scientific American_, 30-193.) Enormous fall of ants, Nancy, France,
July 21, 1887--"most of them were wingless." (_Nature_, 36-349.) Fall of
enormous, unknown ants--size of wasps--Manitoba, June, 1895. (_Sci.
Amer._, 72-385.)
However, our expression will be:
That wingless, larval forms of life, in numbers so enormous that
migration from some place external to this earth is suggested, have
fallen from the sky.
That these "migrations"--if such can be our acceptance--have occurred at
a time of hibernation and burial far in the ground of larvae in the
northern latitudes of this earth; that there is significance in
recurrence of these falls in the last of January--or that we have the
square of an incredibility in such a notion as that of selection of
larvae by whirlwinds, compounded with selection of the last of January.
I accept that there are "snow worms" upon this earth--whatever their
origin may have been. In the _Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. of Philadelphia_,
1899-125, there is a description of yellow worms and black worms that
have been found together on glaciers in Alaska. Almost positively were
there no other forms of insect-life upon these glaciers, and there was
no vegetation to support insect-life, except microscopic organisms.
Nevertheless the description of this probably polymorphic species fits a
description of larvae said to have fallen in Switzerland, and less
definitely fits another description. There is no opposition here, if our
data of falls are clear. Frogs of every-day ponds look like frogs said
to have fallen from the sky--except the whitish frogs of Birmingham.
However, all falls of larvae have not positively occurred in the last of
January:
London _Times_, April 14, 1837:
That, in the parish of Bramford Speke, Devonshire, a large number of
black worms, about three-quarters of an inch in length, had fallen in a
snowstorm.
In Timb's _Year Book_, 1877-26, it is said that, in the winter of 1876,
at Christiania, Norway, worms were found crawling upon the ground. The
occurrence is considered a great mystery, because the worms could not
have come up from the ground, inasmuch as the ground was frozen at the
time, and because they were reported from other places, also, in Norway.
Immense number of black insects in a snowstorm, in 1827, at Pakroff,
Russia. (_Scientific American_, 30-193.)
Fall, with snow, at Orenburg, Russia, Dec. 14, 1830, of a multitude of
small, black insects, said to have been gnats, but also said to have had
flea-like motions. (_Amer. Jour. Sci._, 1-22-375.)
Large number of worms found in a snowstorm, upon the surface of snow
about four inches thick, near Sangerfield, N.Y., Nov. 18, 1850
(_Scientific American_, 6-96). The writer thinks that the worms had been
brought to the surface of the ground by rain, which had fallen
previously.
_Scientific American_, Feb. 21, 1891:
"A puzzling phenomenon has been noted frequently in some parts of the
Valley Bend District, Randolph County, Va., this winter. The crust of
the snow has been covered two or three times with worms resembling the
ordinary cut worms. Where they come from, unless they fall with the snow
is inexplicable." In the _Scientific American_, March 7, 1891, the
Editor says that similar worms had been seen upon the snow near Utica,
N.Y., and in Oneida and Herkimer Counties; that some of the worms had
been sent to the Department of Agriculture at Washington. Again two
species, or polymorphism. According to Prof. Riley, it was not
polymorphism, "but two distinct species"--which, because of our data, we
doubt. One kind was larger than the other: color-differences not
distinctly stated. One is called the larvae of the common soldier beetle
and the other "seems to be a variety of the bronze cut worm." No attempt
to explain the occurrence in snow.
Fall of great numbers of larvae of beetles, near Mortagne, France, May,
1858. The larvae were inanimate as if with cold. (_Annales Societe
Entomologique de France_, 1858.)
_Trans. Ent. Soc. of London_, 1871-183, records "snowing of larvae," in
Silesia, 1806; "appearance of many larvae on the snow," in Saxony,
1811; "larvae found alive on the snow," 1828; larvae and snow which
"fell together," in the Eifel, Jan. 30, 1847; "fall of insects," Jan.
24, 1849, in Lithuania; occurrence of larvae estimated at 300,000 on the
snow in Switzerland, in 1856. The compiler says that most of these
larvae live underground, or at the roots of trees; that whirlwinds
uproot trees, and carry away the larvae--conceiving of them as not held
in masses of frozen earth--all as neatly detachable as currants in
something. In the _Revue et Magasin de Zoologie_, 1849-72, there is an
account of the fall in Lithuania, Jan. 24, 1849--that black larvae had
fallen in enormous numbers.
Larvae thought to have been of beetles, but described as "caterpillars,"
not seen to fall, but found crawling on the snow, after a snowstorm, at
Warsaw, Jan. 20, 1850. (_All the Year Round_, 8-253.)
Flammarion (_The Atmosphere_, p. 414) tells of a fall of larvae that
occurred Jan. 30, 1869, in a snowstorm, in Upper Savoy: "They could not
have been hatched in the neighborhood, for, during the days preceding,
the temperature had been very low"; said to have been of a species
common in the south of France. In _La Science Pour Tous_, 14-183, it is
said that with these larvae there were developed insects.
_L'Astronomie_, 1890-313:
That, upon the last of January, 1890, there fell, in a great tempest, in
Switzerland, incalculable numbers of larvae: some black and some yellow;
numbers so great that hosts of birds were attracted.
Altogether we regard this as one of our neatest expressions for external
origins and against the whirlwind explanation. If an exclusionist says
that, in January, larvae were precisely and painstakingly picked out of
frozen ground, in incalculable numbers, he thinks of a tremendous
force--disregarding its refinements: then if origin and precipitation be
not far apart, what becomes of an infinitude of other debris, conceiving
of no time for segregation?
If he thinks of a long translation--all the way from the south of France
to Upper Savoy, he may think then of a very fine sorting over by
differences of specific gravity--but in such a fine selection, larvae
would be separated from developed insects.
As to differences in specific gravity--the yellow larvae that fell in
Switzerland January, 1890, were three times the size of the black larvae
that fell with them. In accounts of this occurrence, there is no denial
of the fall.
Or that a whirlwind never brought them together and held them together
and precipitated them and only them together--
That they came from Genesistrine.
There's no escape from it. We'll be persecuted for it. Take it or leave
it--
Genesistrine.
The notion is that there is somewhere aloft a place of origin of life
relatively to this earth. Whether it's the planet Genesistrine, or the
moon, or a vast amorphous region super-jacent to this earth, or an
island in the Super-Sargasso Sea, should perhaps be left to the
researches of other super--or extra--geographers. That the first
unicellular organisms may have come here from Genesistrine--or that men
or anthropomorphic beings may have come here before amoebae: that, upon
Genesistrine, there may have been an evolution expressible in
conventional biologic terms, but that evolution upon this earth has
been--like evolution in modern Japan--induced by external influences;
that evolution, as a whole, upon this earth, has been a process of
population by immigration or by bombardment. Some notes I have upon
remains of men and animals encysted, or covered with clay or stone, as
if fired here as projectiles, I omit now, because it seems best to
regard the whole phenomenon as a tropism--as a geotropism--probably
atavistic, or vestigial, as it were, or something still continuing long
after expiration of necessity; that, once upon a time, all kinds of
things came here from Genesistrine, but that now only a few kinds of
bugs and things, at long intervals, feel the inspiration.
Not one instance have we of tadpoles that have fallen to this earth. It
seems reasonable that a whirlwind could scoop up a pond, frogs and all,
and cast down the frogs somewhere else: but, then, more reasonable that
a whirlwind could scoop up a pond, tadpoles and all--because tadpoles
are more numerous in their season than are the frogs in theirs: but the
tadpole-season is earlier in the spring, or in a time that is more
tempestuous. Thinking in terms of causation--as if there were real
causes--our notion is that, if X is likely to cause Y, but is more
likely to cause Z, but does not cause Z, X is not the cause of Y. Upon
this quasi-sorites, we base our acceptance that the little frogs that
have fallen to this earth are not products of whirlwinds: that they came
from externality, or from Genesistrine.
I think of Genesistrine in terms of biologic mechanics: not that
somewhere there are persons who collect bugs in or about the last of
January and frogs in July and August, and bombard this earth, any more
than do persons go through northern regions, catching and collecting
birds, every autumn, then casting them southward.
But atavistic, or vestigial, geotropism in Genesistrine--or a million
larvae start crawling, and a million little frogs start hopping--knowing
no more what it's all about than we do when we crawl to work in the
morning and hop away at night.
I should say, myself, that Genesistrine is a region in the
Super-Sargasso Sea, and that parts of the Super-Sargasso Sea have
rhythms of susceptibility to this earth's attraction.
8
I accept that, when there are storms, the damnedest of excluded,
excommunicated things--things that are leprous to the faithful--are
brought down--from the Super-Sargasso Sea--or from what for convenience
we call the Super-Sargasso Sea--which by no means has been taken into
full acceptance yet.
That things are brought down by storms, just as, from the depths of the
sea things are brought up by storms. To be sure it is orthodoxy that
storms have little, if any, effect below the waves of the ocean--but--of
course--only to have an opinion is to be ignorant of, or to disregard a
contradiction, or something else that modifies an opinion out of
distinguishability.
_Symons' Meteorological Magazine_, 47-180:
That, along the coast of New Zealand, in regions not subject to
submarine volcanic action, deep-sea fishes are often brought up by
storms.
Iron and stones that fall from the sky; and atmospheric disturbances:
"There is absolutely no connection between the two phenomena."
(_Symons._)
The orthodox belief is that objects moving at planetary velocity would,
upon entering this earth's atmosphere, be virtually unaffected by
hurricanes; might as well think of a bullet swerved by someone fanning
himself. The only trouble with the orthodox reasoning is the usual
trouble--its phantom-dominant--its basing upon a myth--data we've had,
and more we'll have, of things in the sky having no independent
velocity.
There are so many storms and so many meteors and meteorites that it
would be extraordinary if there were no concurrences. Nevertheless so
many of these concurrences are listed by Prof. Baden-Powell (_Rept.
Brit. Assoc._, 1850-54) that one--notices.
See _Rept. Brit. Assoc._, 1860--other instances.