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THE ROMANCE
OF
NATURAL HISTORY.
EDINBURGH:
PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE AND COMPANY,
PAUL'S WORK.
[Illustration: FASCINATION.
_Front._]
THE ROMANCE
OF
NATURAL HISTORY.
by
Philip Henry Gosse, F.R.S.
Second Series.
LONDON:
JAMES NISBET AND CO., 21 BERNERS STREET.
M.DCCC.LXI.
CONTENTS.
I. THE EXTINCT.
PAGE
Death of Species -- Some Died in Early Historic Ages -- Some Dying Now
-- Changes of Land and Water -- Tertiary State of Europe -- Dinothere of
Germany -- Sivathere of India -- Gigantic Tortoise -- Pachyderms of
Siberia -- Rhinoceros -- Mammoth -- Mastodon of America -- Great
Quadrupeds of South America -- Sloths -- Habits of Mylodon -- Macrauchen
-- Toxodon -- Ancient Australia and its Colossal Birds -- Ancient
Britain -- Its Flora and Fauna -- Irish Elk -- Carnivores -- Chronology
of the Tertiary Era -- Contemporaneous Existence of Man with the Fossil
Fauna -- Gigantic Tortoise -- Condition of Siberian Pachyderms --
Discovery of the Remains -- Contemporary Fauna of Britain -- Chinese and
Siberian Traditions -- Indian Traditions of the Mastodon -- State of its
Remains -- Its Food -- Comparative Lateness of Geologic Processes in
America -- Possibility that the Mastodon was a Beast of Burden -- Darwin
on the South American Sloths -- Freshness of their Remains --
Synchronism with Existing Creatures -- Birds of New Zealand -- Maori
Tales -- Evidence of Recent Existence -- Story of an English Seaman --
Examination of its Truth -- Fossil Eggs -- Comparison of Dimensions --
Larger Eggs in Madagascar -- AEpyornis -- Its Present Existence Possible
-- Discovery of the Notornis -- Tertiary Britain -- Fossil Man -- Worked
Flints -- Associated with Fossil Bones -- Species -- Age of Man --
Alluvium of the Nile -- Conclusions from it Delusive -- Rates of
Geologic Changes Variable -- Examples -- Evidence of Contemporaneity of
Man with the Tertiary Fauna -- Irish Elk -- State of its Remains --
Traditionary and Documentary Evidence of its Recent Existence --
Slaughtered by Man -- Proof of this Fact -- Great Accumulation of Skulls
at Lough Gur -- Weapons found with Elk Relics -- Proofs of its having
been Cooked -- Manner of Hunting the Elk -- Ancient Irish Poem on
Animals -- No Allusion to the Elk in it -- This Explained -- Notices of
Early Oxen -- Their Fossil Relics -- Caesar's Account of the Urus -- Wild
Oxen in Ancient Greece and Western Asia -- Guy of Warwick and the Dun
Cow -- The Turnbulls -- The Urus Fossil in Britain -- Vast Size of
Fossil Oxen -- Scanian Fossil Ox bearing a Spear-wound -- Other Ancient
Oxen -- European Bison -- British Bears -- Period of their Extinction --
Extinction of the Wolf -- Beaver Extinct in Britain -- Almost Extinct in
Europe -- Dodo -- Accounts of Voyagers -- Seen in London -- Museum
Relics -- Paintings -- Stelleria -- Cheiromys -- Moho -- Kaureke --
Manu-mea -- Nestor of Norfolk Island -- Great Auk -- Its Recent
Abundance -- Catalogue of Specimens and Eggs in Cabinets -- Falkland Fox
-- Musk Ox -- Hand-tree of Mexico -- Attempt to Estimate the Rate of
Species-extinction -- Perhaps One a Year -- Question of Continuous
Creation of Species -- Causes of Extinction -- Thoughts of Owen and
Darwin -- Geographic Distribution an Important Element -- Fauna Peculiar
to Islands -- Red Grouse -- Precariousness of its Existence, 1
II. THE MARVELLOUS.
Vulgar Love of Marvels -- False Causes -- Counter Tendency of Science --
Blood-Showers -- Traced to Butterfly-discharges -- Worms in Horse Pond
-- Crimson Snow -- Discharges of Birds -- Real Red Rain -- Waters turned
to Blood -- Oscillatoria -- Infusoria -- "Raining Cats and Dogs" --
Snail-showers -- Frog-showers -- At Portobello -- At Leeds -- On the
Continent -- Fish-showers -- The Aberdare Shower -- Explanations and
Criticisms -- Veritable Fish-showers in South America -- In India -- In
Ceylon -- Torpidity of Fishes in Mud -- Lepidosiren -- Its Structure --
Amphibious Fishes -- Climbing Perch -- Salarias of Ceylon -- Provisional
Structure, 96
III. MERMAIDS.
The Oannes of Berosus -- Assyrian Representations of Mermen -- Dagon and
Atergatis -- Universal Belief in Mermaids -- Opinion of Swainson --
Sirens in Dongola -- Museum Specimens -- Japanese Ingenuity -- Accounts
of Living Specimens -- Assumed to be Cow-whales -- Indian Accounts --
Scandinavian Myths -- Mermaids in Shetland -- A Love Story -- Cavern in
Skye -- Veritable Narratives -- Hudson's Report -- Steller's Sea-ape --
Rencontre of Weddell's Seaman -- Merman seen at Landscrone -- Mermaid
Captured by Six Shetlandmen -- Comments on the Story -- Critical
Examination of it, 125
IV. THE SELF-IMMURED.
Toads Found in Wood and Stone -- Difficulties -- Bell's Caution --
Current Explanations -- Mr Bartlett's Toad in Fir-tree -- His Letter in
Reply -- Mr Bree's Toad in Sandstone -- Mr Peacock's Toad in Lias --
Toad in Tamarind-wood in India -- Comments on the Report -- Toad in
Flint at Blois -- Toad in Iron Ore -- _Audi alteram partem_ -- Mr
Plant's Disappointment -- Seven Frogs in Nodules of Limestone -- Toad
Immured in Old Wall -- Frog in Freestone -- Toads deep in Stiff Clay --
Experiments -- Dr Buckland Immures Toads in Oolitic Limestone and
Sandstone -- Results -- Dr Buckland's Conclusions -- Toads Inclosed in
Plaster of Paris -- Critical Examination of the Experiments --
Objections to the Conclusions -- Evidence rather in Favour of Common
Belief -- Toad Sixteen Years in Closed-in Wall -- Toad in Mortar under a
Horse-block -- Indefinite Torpidity of Wasps -- Mr Bartlett Finds a Bat
in a Vault Closed for Twenty Years -- Mr Smith Finds a Bat in a Vault
Closed for One Hundred and Six Years, 146
V. HYBERNATION OF SWALLOWS.
The Question -- Popular Belief -- Scientific Statements of Swallows'
Torpidity and Submersion -- Achard's Statement -- White's Account --
Cases given by Bishop Stanley -- Supposed Torpidity of American Swift --
Hybernating Corn-crakes -- Barrington's Reports of Torpid Swallows --
Curator Wall's Story -- Fitton's Story -- Swallows in Britain during
Winter -- Cases recorded by White -- Montagu -- Yarrell -- C. Bree --
Bell -- Hewitson -- Harcourt -- Rodd -- Hadfield -- W. Bree -- Johnston
-- Gurney -- Examination of the Evidence -- Conclusion in Favour of
Torpidity, 191
VI. THE CRESTED AND WATTLED SNAKE.
Seba's Museum -- His "Thesaurus" -- Figures of Curious Serpents -- What
could they have been? -- Proofs that they were Ophidian, not Piscine --
Reports of Wonderful Serpent in Jamaica -- Singular Character of its
Habitat -- Geological and Botanical Features -- Locale of Three-fingered
Jack -- Crested Snake Killed here -- Negro Stories of its Voice -- Heard
of in Hayti -- Author's Efforts to obtain a Specimen -- Occurrence of
Two Specimens, 211
VII. THE DOUBTFUL.
Viper Swallowing her Young -- Conflicting Statements -- Physiologically
not Impossible -- Reports of Witnesses -- Mr Percival's Account -- Mr
Wolley's Corroboration -- Mr Bond's Testimony -- Case of the Rattlesnake
-- Seen by Palisot de Beauvois -- Case of the Common Lizard -- Comments
on the Evidence.
Madame Merian -- Her Truth Impeached -- Her Story of the Lantern-fly --
Denials of its Luminosity by Entomologists -- Confirmation of it by
Lacordaire -- By Spinola -- By Wesmael -- English Insects only
Occasionally Luminous -- Mole-cricket -- The Cause of _ignis fatuus_ --
Crane-fly -- Luminous Caterpillars -- Perhaps a Disease.
Madame Merian again Arraigned -- Her Account of Spiders Preying on
Humming-birds -- Mr MacLeay's Denial and Proof of the Negative --
Comment on his Evidence -- Langsdorff's Evidence -- Ceylon Spiders --
Sir E. Tennent's Criticisms -- Collateral Evidence for the Affirmative
-- Strong Webs of _Nephila_ -- The Solfuga of India -- Account of its
Habits -- Attacks and Overcomes Small Birds -- Captain Sherwill Saw a
Spider Eating a Bird in India -- Moreau de Jonnes' Direct Confirmation
of Merian -- Mr H. Bates's Conclusive Testimony, 220
VIII. FASCINATION.
Power Attributed to Serpents of Paralysing their Prey -- Dr Bird's Story
of Black Snake -- Rattlesnake and Squirrel -- Cobra and Lizard --
African Snake and Mouse -- Snake and Frog -- Habits of the Boomslange --
Snake and Shrike -- Snake and Mouse -- Dr Evans's Observations on
Serpents at the Zoological Gardens -- Ringed Snake and Hedge Sparrow --
Snake and Robin -- Indian Serpent and Eel -- Attempted Explanations --
Mr Martin's Observations -- Barton Attributes the Phenomena to Maternal
Love -- Explanation Inadequate -- The Power Exercised by Other Animals
-- Lizard and Butterfly -- Scorpion and Fly -- Stoats and Hares -- Foxes
and Pullets -- Eagle and Rabbit -- Attractive Power of Fire --
Entomologist's Bull's-eye Lamp -- Yard-fire in Alabama -- Insects come
to the Fire -- Titmouse around a Gas-lamp -- Bell Rock Lighthouse
visited by Herring-gull -- Fire Fascinates Toads in Africa, 242
IX. SERPENT-CHARMING.
Revulsion Inspired by the Serpent -- Persons Professing Immunity against
Venomous Serpents -- Scriptural Allusions -- The Ancient Psylli and
Marsi -- Babylonian Magician -- Atyr -- Immunity Distinct from
Serpent-charming -- Hexagon the Ambassador -- Posterity of Psylli in
Sennaar -- Bruce's Curious Account -- Various Plants Antidotic to
Serpent-venom -- Experiments on _Simaba Cedron_ -- Peruvian Serpents and
Remedies -- Various South American Antidotes -- Vejuco of Venezuela --
Grass of Dahomey -- Immunity of Mangouste -- Anecdotes -- Of Hedgehog --
Bruce's Account of the Cerastes -- Hasselquist's Observations -- Psyllic
Woman -- Power of Spittle -- Influence of Music on Serpents --
Proceedings of Egyptian Charmers -- Rattlesnake Charmed by a Flute --
Cobra of India Attracted by Music -- Occasional Failures and Fatalities
-- Anecdotes -- Comments -- Psylli in London -- Are the Poison-fangs
Extracted? -- Power of Snake-stones -- Napier's and Tennent's Accounts
-- Faraday's Analysis -- Plant-remedies, 263
X. BEAUTY.
Delight in Beauty -- Divine Appreciation of it -- Magnificent Flower in
a Thicket -- Beauty of Deer -- Pet Fawn -- Eye of Gazelle -- Spotted Fur
-- Zebra-stripes -- Birds -- Spoonbills on the Amazon -- Carolina
Parakeet -- Cock of the Rock -- Soft blending in the Goatsuckers --
Resplendent Trogon -- Metallic Colours -- Rifle-bird -- Plume-birds --
Iridescent Hues -- Sun-birds -- Humming-birds -- Mexican Names --
Jamaican Humming-birds -- Mango -- Long-tail -- Cause of changeable
Lustre -- Angle of Light -- Other Examples -- Region of the Amazon and
Rio Negro -- Birds -- Fiery Topaz Humming-bird -- Cerro of Potosi --
Night-blowing Cactus -- Bar-tail Comet -- Pheasant tribe -- Chinese
Pheasants -- Fire-back of Java -- Argus of Malacca -- Impeyan of India
-- Polyprectons -- Peacock -- Wild Peacock-shooting -- Paradise-birds --
Emerald -- His Vanity in Dress -- Splendour of Insects -- Metallic
Beetles -- Soft Refulgence -- Gem-scales -- Butterflies -- Changes of
Hue -- Opalescence -- Ray on the "_Cui bono?_" -- Smith on South
American Butterflies -- Splendour of Spiders -- in Jamaica -- in Borneo
-- Tortoise-beetles -- Beauty of Plants -- Mosses -- Ferns -- Palms --
Grasses -- Bamboo -- in Jamaica -- in Madagascar -- Plantains -- Scene
in Tahiti -- Beauty exceeds our Power of Imbibing it -- Flowers --
Orchideae -- Sobralia -- Cypripedium -- Anaectochilus -- Dendrobium --
Huntleya -- Scene in Guiana -- Death of Reiss -- Rhododendrons of
Himalayas -- of Borneo -- Lightning-tree of Madagascar -- Flamboyant --
Barbadoes Pride -- Burmese tree -- Le Bois Immortel -- Scene in Tartary
-- Microscopic Beauties of London Pride, 302
XI. PARASITES.
Fleas on fleas _ad infinitum_ -- Intestinal Worms -- Economy of
Creation -- Epiphyte Vegetation -- Life in a Sea-weed -- Orchids in the
Tropics -- Parasitic Fig-trees -- Lianes -- in Ceylon -- Parasitism in
Insects -- Ichneumons -- Kirby's Discovery of Stylops -- Economy --
Oil-beetle -- Medusa and Shrimp -- Medusa parasitic on Medusa -- Fish in
Stomach of Star-fish -- Crab and Sponge -- Hermit Crab and Polype --
Parasites in Corals -- Ostrich parasitic on Ostrich -- Cuckoo and Cowpen
birds -- Veneration of Small Birds for Cuckoo -- Slavery among Ants --
Nigger-hunting, 359
APPENDIX.
Sea-serpent -- Additional Testimonies to its Existence -- Statement of
Consul Grattan -- Communication from Mr Stephen Cave, 387
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PLATE PAGE
I. FASCINATION (_Frontispiece_).
II. ENCOUNTER WITH A MOA, 36
III. SPEARING THE ANCIENT ELK, 56
IV. THE CLIMBING PERCH, 122
V. TOAD IN A HOLE, 158
VI. BIRD-EATING SPIDER, 240
VII. SNAKE-CHARMING, 278
VIII. ANTELOPES, 304
IX. PLUME-BIRD, 310
X. PEACOCK-SHOOTING, 326
THE ROMANCE OF NATURAL HISTORY.
I.
THE EXTINCT.
If it is a scene of painful interest, as surely it is to a
well-constituted mind, to stand by and watch the death-struggles of one
of the nobler brutes,--a dog or an elephant, for example,--to mark the
failing strength, the convulsive throes, the appealing looks, the sobs
and sighs, the rattling breath, the glazing eye, the stiffening
limbs--how much more exciting is the interest with which we watch the
passing away of a dying species. For species have their appointed
periods as well as individuals: viewed in the infinite mind of GOD, the
Creator, from the standpoint of eternity, each form, each race, had its
proper duration assigned to it--a duration which, doubtless, varied in
the different species as greatly as that assigned to the life of one
individual animal differs from that assigned to the life of another. As
the elephant or the eagle may survive for centuries, while the horse and
the dog scarcely reach to twenty years, and multitudes of insects are
born and die within a few weeks, so one species may have assigned to
its life, for aught I know, a hundred thousand years as its normal
period, and another not more than a thousand. If creation was, with
respect to the species, what I have elsewhere proved it was with respect
to the individual,[1]--a violent irruption into the cycle of life--then
we may well conceive this to have taken place at very varying relative
periods in the life-history of the different species;--that is to say,
that at a given date, (viz., that of creation) one species might be just
completing, _ideally_, its allotted course, another just commencing, and
a third attaining its meridian.
Certain it is, that not a few species of animals have died during the
present constitution of things. Races, which we know on indubitable
evidence to have existed during the dominion of man, have died out, have
become extinct, so that not a single individual survives. The entire
totality of individuals which constituted the species, have, in these
cases, ceased to be. Some of these seem to have died at a very early era
of human history; but others at a comparatively recent period, and some
even within our own times. Even within the last twenty years several
animals have been taken, of which it is highly probable that not a
single representative remains on the earth; while there are others yet
again, which we know to be reduced to a paucity so extreme, that their
extinction can scarcely be delayed more than a few years at most. Thus
we may consider ourselves as standing by the dying-beds of these
creatures, with the consciousness that we shall soon see them no more;
that the sentence is gone forth against them; that their sands are
running to the last grains, and that no effort of ours can materially
prolong their existence. The facts from which these conclusions are
drawn are highly curious, and I shall endeavour to lay them, with as
much brevity as they will allow, before my readers.
On that prochronic hypothesis, by which alone, as I conceive, the facts
revealed by geological investigation can be reconciled with the unerring
statements of Scripture,--every word of which is truth, the truth of a
"God that cannot lie,"--we may assume the actual creation of this earth
to have taken place at that period which is geologically known as the
later Tertiary Era, or thereabout. When, on the third day, "the waters
under the heaven were gathered together into one place, and the dry land
appeared," it is not necessary to suppose that the form assumed by the
emerging land was immediately that which it now has; we may, on the
other hand, I think, assume as likely, that successive or continuous
changes of elevation followed, which have been protracted, perhaps
constantly decreasing in extent and force, to the present hour.[2]
Perhaps between the six days' work of Creation and the Noachic Flood,
Europe became much altered in outline, and in elevation. It may have
been, at first, a great archipelago, agreeing with the epithet by which
it is designated in early Scripture, "the Isles,"[3] and by which it
was subsequently known for ages. The Pyrenees, the Alps, and the
Apennines, already emerged, were slowly uniting, and the Carpathians,
the Balkan, the Taurus, and the Caucasus, were uprearing, while the vast
regions to the north were still an expanse of open sea. England was
probably united with the newly-formed European continent, and embraced
Ireland in one great mass of unbroken land, which stretched far away
into the Atlantic. Volcanoes were active in the north of Ireland, and in
the west of Scotland, pouring forth those floods of fiery lava which
have cooled into the columnar forms seen at the Giant's Causeway and the
Cave of Fingal. Slowly the north of Europe emerged, and the great
south-west expanse of Britain sank beneath the sea, leaving, it may be,
the large island of Atlantis in mid-ocean, to be submerged by a later
catastrophe.
Probably changes very similar were coevally taking place in Asia and
North America, while the vast flat alluvial regions of South America
were, perhaps, even still more recently formed, and a great Pacific
continent was in course of subsidence, of which Australasia and
Polynesia are the existing remains.
Such changes of elevation, and of the continuity of land, must effect
considerable alterations of climate; and, therefore, it is not
surprising to know that, in earliest ages, animals and plants flourished
in regions to which they would now be altogether unfitted, and that
many races existed then which have since died out; for geological and
climatal modifications are among the most easily conceivable causes of
the decease of species.
In the great swamps of emerging Germany, and in the, as yet, only
half-drained valleys of Switzerland, lurked then the heavy Dinothere.
Huger than the hugest elephant, he carried an enormous body of twenty
feet in length, vast and barrel-like, which even his columnar limbs of
ten feet long scarcely sufficed to raise from the ground. His uncouth
head, elephantine in shape, was furnished with a short proboscis; and
two tusks, short and strong, projected from the lower jaw, not curving
upward, as in the elephant, but downward, as in the walrus. In the
teeming marshes lurked this ungainly beast, half immersed, digging out
with his mighty pickaxe-tusks the succulent roots that permeated the
soft soil, which his sensitive trunk picked up, and conveyed to his
mouth.
On the southern slopes of the slowly-rising Himalayas, already clothed
with forests of teak, and palm, and bamboo, revelled the Sivathere,
another heavy creature, of the bulk of a rhinoceros, and therefore not
more than half equalling the German colossus. He too was a strange
subject. With a proportionally enormous head, in form somewhat between
that of the elephant and of the rhinoceros, minute sunken piggish eyes,
and a short proboscis like that of the tapir, he carried two pairs of
dissimilar horns. On the forehead were placed one pair, seated upon bony
cores, not unlike those of our short-horn oxen. Behind these there rose
another pair, large and massive, which were palmated and branching,
like those of the fallow-deer, but on a gigantic scale. What sort of a
body, and what kind of limbs, furnished the complement of this
curiously-compound head, we do not exactly know; but surely it must have
been a very remarkable form, as it browsed quietly and blamelessly,
among the luxuriant shrubs of those sun-facing slopes.
In the same regions a land Tortoise of enormous bulk, far vaster than
the vastest of now existing species, to which that ponderous one which
will march merrily away with a ton weight on its back, is a mere pigmy,
shook the earth with its waddle, and the forests with its hoarse
bellowing. Broad roads, like our highways, were beaten by it through the
jungle, along which it periodically travelled to the cool springs,
leisurely sauntering, and tarrying to munch the fleshy gourds and
cactuses that bordered its self-made track.
The plains of Siberia, stretching away towards the Arctic Ocean,
sheltered countless hosts of huge pachydermatous quadrupeds. A species
of Rhinoceros, not less bulky than those of the present age, roamed to
the very verge of the Icy Sea; its hide, tough and leathery, was
destitute of folds, but was clothed with tufts of rigid gray hair,--an
ornament which is denied to our existing degenerates. Two horns, the
front one of unusual massiveness and length, were seated, as in several
of the African kinds, one behind the other, and were wielded by a head
of great strength and development.
More remarkable still was that great hairy Elephant, called the
Mammoth, which appears to have swarmed in those cold plains by myriads.
Of equal dimensions to the Indian species of the present age, this
denizen of the north had far more enormous curving tusks, and instead of
the naked hide of those we are familiar with, his body was encased in
black hair, with a thick under stratum of red curled wool, and bore a
long mane on the ridge of the neck.
There was, at the same time, a quadruped, nearly allied to the
elephants, but differing from them in some technical characters. With a
body equally bulky, but considerably longer, it had shorter limbs, a
broader head, small tusks in the lower, as well as large curving ones in
the upper jaw, and probably a trunk intermediate between the elephant's
and the tapir's. Truly cosmopolite as this great Mastodon was, for we
dig up his bones from all parts of the world, he had his head-quarters
in North America, where, from his dimensions and his numbers, he must
have formed a very characteristic feature of the primeval swamps and
forests. There, with his tusks, he grubbed up the young trees, whose
juicy roots he ground down with his great mammillary molar teeth, or
chewed up to a pulp the sapwood of the recent branches and spicy twigs.
And ever and anon he would resort to the broad saline marshes,--the
"Licks," as they are now called,--to lick up the crystallised salt on
their margins, so grateful to all herbivorous quadrupeds. Here, in his
eagerness to gratify his palate with the pungent condiment, he would
press farther and farther into the treacherous quagmire, till he began
to sink, and then, in his terror, he would plunge and flounder, getting
more and more deeply bemired, till at length he could struggle no more,
and the bog would close over him, and he would be no more seen till some
spectacled geologist of this nineteenth century, note-book in hand,
would go and dig up his remains, marvelling at the freshness with which
they had been preserved in the antiseptic peat.
But let us look at South America, where, as the great back-bone chain of
the Andes is being elevated out of the sea, the torrents and cataracts
are pouring down from its sides immense quantities of crumbled rock and
pasty mud, which, deposited upon the vast tabular field, brought by the
upheaving just to the level of the sea, forms that grand alluvial plain
unequalled on the face of the globe for extent, which is clothed with
the mighty forests of Guiana and Brazil, or with the tall grass and
thistles of the Pampas. The torrents still fall; and, meandering through
this glorious plain, unite and form the most majestic of rivers, ever
depositing the rich alluvium, and thus sensibly augmenting, to this day,
the breadth of their noble continent, and their own length.
Strange creatures riot here in these primal ages. The young land, hot
and moist,--moist with the unevaporated water of the depositing rivers,
and hot with the influence of the submarine volcano which is lifting it,
as well as with the beams of the tropical sun,--brings forth from its
steaming bosom, the most gigantic trees in the most profuse luxuriance.
And animal life teems too, in this riant vegetation. Millions of
insects,--ants, and termites, and beetles,--are busy at work upon the
trunks of the great trees, eating them down, and swarming in their
immense populous nests, beyond all imaginings. Surely they will soon eat
up the entire forest, dense and rapid as it grows, and there will be
nothing left but cities of insects. No fear! See those great waddling
beasts[4] with stout short legs, and enormous hoof-like claws so bent
inward that the creatures are obliged to walk on the edge of their
paws,--they are equally busy with the insects, tearing apart with their
powerful claws the earthy nests as fast as they are built, and devouring
the makers themselves by wholesale. Here is a wonderful creature, a vast
armadillo, with a body as big as a rhinoceros, covered with a convex
oval shield, formed of hexagonal plates accurately fitted to each other.
See how he approaches a fallen tree, which his unerring instinct tells
him is perforated through and through, and filled with the swarming
millions of ants; with his powerful jaws he munches up the entire mass;
the thin and papery partitions of the dusty wood are ground to powder,
and the ants are licked in and chewed into a black pulp between those
curious cylinders of teeth.
But lo! here are mightier creatures yet! See the vast Mylodon, the
Scelidothere, and the still more colossal Megathere. Ponderous giants
these! The very forests seem to tremble under their stately stride.
Their immense bulk preponderates behind, terminating in a tail of
wonderful thickness and solidity: the head is mean and awakens no
terror; the eye lacks lustre and threatens no violence, though the whole
form betokens vast power, and the stout limbs are terminated by the same
stout, inbent, sharp hoof-claws. One of them approaches that
wide-spreading locust-tree; he gazes up at the huge mud-brown structures
that resemble hogsheads affixed to the forks of the branches, and he
knows that the luscious termites are filling them to overflowing. His
lips water at the tempting sight; have them he must. But how? that heavy
sternpost of his was never made for climbing; yet see! he rears himself
up against the tree; is he about to essay the scaling? Not he: he knows
his powers better. He gives it one embrace; one strong hug; as if to
test its thickness and hold upon the earth. Now he is digging away
below, scooping out the soft soil from between the roots,--and it is
marvellous to note how rapidly he lays them bare with those great
shovel-like claws of his. Now he rears himself again; straddles wide on
his hind feet, fixing the mighty claws deep in the ground; plants
himself firmly on his huge tail, as on the third foot of a tripod, and
once more grasps the tree. The enormous hind quarters, the limbs and the
loins, the broad pelvis, the thick spinal cord supplying abundant
nervous energy to the swelling muscles, inserted in the ridged and
keeled bones, all come into play, as a _point d'appui_ for the Herculean
effort. "And now conceive the massive frame of the Megathere convulsed
with the mighty wrestling, every vibrating fibre reacting upon its bony
attachment with the force of a hundred giants: extraordinary must be the
strength and proportions of the tree, if, when rocked to and fro, to
right and left, in such an embrace, it can long withstand the efforts of
its assailant."[5] It yields; the roots fly up; the earth is scattered
wide upon the surrounding foliage; the tree comes down with a thundering
crash, cracking and snapping the great boughs like glass; the frightened
insects swarm out at every orifice; but the huge beast is in upon them;
with his sharp hoofs he tears apart the crusty walls of the earth-nests,
and licks out their living contents, fat pupae, eggs and all, rolling
down the sweet morsels, half sucking, half chewing, with a delighted
gusto that repays him for all his mighty toil.
While the heavy giant is absorbed in his juicy breakfast, see, there
lounges along his neighbour, the Macrauchen. Equally massive, equally
heavy, equally vast, equally peaceful, the stranger resembles a huge
rhinoceros elevated on much loftier limbs; but his most remarkable
feature is an enormously long neck, like that of the camel, but carried
to the altitude of that of the giraffe. Thus he thrusts his great muzzle
into the very centre of the leafy trees, and gathering with his
prehensile and flexible lip the succulent twigs and foliage, he too
finds abundance of food for his immense body, in the teeming vegetation,
without intruding upon the supply of his fellows.
And what enormous mass is suddenly thrust up out of the quiet water of
yonder igaripe? A hoarse, hollow grunt, as it comes up, tells us that
it is alive, and now we discern that it is the head of an animal--the
Toxodon. Half hidden as it is under the shadow of the fan-palms, and the
broad, arrowy leaves of the great arums that grow out of the lake, we
see the little piggish eyes, set far up in the great head, and wide
apart, peeping with a curious union of stupidity and shrewdness; the
immense muzzle and lips; the broad cheeks armed with stiff projecting
bristles; and, as the creature opens its cavernous mouth to seize a
floating gourd, an extraordinary array of incurving teeth, strangely
bowed so as to make a series of arches of immense power. Now, with his
strong front teeth, he tears up the great fleshy arum-roots from the
clay of the bank, and grinds them to pulp; and now, with another grunt,
the vast bristly head sinks beneath the water, and we see it no more.
Hundreds of other creatures are straying around,--sloths, bats, and
monkeys, and birds of gay plumage, on the trees; ant-eaters and cavies,
lizards and snakes, on the ground; butterflies and humming-birds
hovering in the air; tapirs and turtles and crocodiles in the
waters;--but these are matters of course:--we are only thinking of such
as have passed away and left no descendants to perpetuate their forms to
our own times.
Away to the great Austral land--in our day minished to the insular
Australia and New Zealand and a few satellite isles--but then, in the
morning of creation, possibly stretching far to the north and on either
hand, so as to include the scattered groups of Polynesia in one great
continent, and even to reach so far as Madagascar on the west. This was
the region of gigantic fowls, and of marsupial quadrupeds. Kangaroos of
eight or nine feet in stature leaped over the primeval bush, and wombats
and dasyures of elephantine bulk burrowed in the hill sides, and great
lion-like beasts prowled about the plains. But surely the most
characteristic feature of the scene was impressed by the birds! Vast
struthious birds, which would have looked down with supreme contempt on
the loftiest African ostrich, whose limb-bones greatly exceeded in bulk
those of our dray horses, whose three-toed feet made a print in the clay
some eighteen inches long, and whose proud heads commanded the horizon
from an elevation of twelve feet above the ground,--terrible birds,
whose main development of might was in the legs and feet, being utterly
destitute of the least trace of wings--these strode swiftly about the
rank ferny brakes, possessing a conscious power of defence in the back
stroke of their muscular feet, and fearless of man or beast, mainly
nocturnal in their activity, concealing themselves by day in the
recesses of the dense forests, where the majestic trees were interwoven
with cable-like climbers, or couching in the midst of tall reeds and
aroideous plants that margined the great swampy lakes of these regions.
But what of our own land? What of these distant isles of the Gentiles in
that early day, when the enterprising sons of Cain, migrating from the
already straitened land of Nod, were pushing their advancing columns,
with arts and arms, in all directions over the young earth? Did any of
them reach to the as yet insular Europe, settling themselves along the
margins of its deep gulfs and draining basins? Perhaps they did, and
even explored the utmost limits of the great Atlantic island, on the
remains of which we live. What did they find here? A land of mountain
and valley, of plain and down, of lake and river, of bog and fell, of
forest and field, in some features much as now: where the oak, and elm,
and ash covered great tracts, and the birch and fir clothed the hills;
but where the yew and the laurel grew side by side with the
custard-apple and the fan-palm, and the ground was overrun with trailers
of the gourd and melon kind, but where grasses were few and scarce, the
exquisite order _Rosaceae_, with its beautiful flowers and grateful
fruit, was rarely seen, and the aromatic _Labiatae_--the thyme, and mint,
and sage--were as yet unknown.
And the beasts that already tenanted this fair land were for bulk and
power worthy of the domain. The Dinothere and the Mastodon wallowed and
browsed where great London now crowds its princely palaces. Through the
greenwood shades of the forests of oak wandered hippopotamuses and
rhinoceroses of several kinds, the long-tusked mammoth, and two or three
species of horses. Two gigantic oxen--a bison and a urus--roamed over
the fir-clad hills of Scotland, and a curious flat-headed ox, of small
size and minute horns, made Ireland its peculiar home. That island, too,
was the metropolis of a colossal fallow-deer, whose remains, ticketed as
those of the Irish Elk, astonish us in our museums. It stood seven feet
in height at the withers, and waved its branching antlers, eleven feet
wide, twelve feet and upwards above the ground;[6] yet its magnificent
stature could not preserve it from a not infrequent fate, that of
becoming intombed in the deep bogs of its native isle. Britain had,
moreover, a stag of scarcely less gigantic proportions, with the
reindeer of the north, and the smaller kinds with which we are now
familiar.
All these herbivores, and numberless smaller genera, some now extinct,
some surviving, were kept in check by powerful predatory tyrants, for
whose representatives we must now look to the jungles of India or the
burning karroos of Southern Africa. The Lion and the Tiger stalked over
these isles, and a terrible tiger-like creature, the Machairode, of even
superior size and power to the scourge of the Bengal jungle, with curved
and saw-edged canine-teeth, hung upon the flanks of the cervine and
bovine herds, and sprang upon the fattest of them. Then, too, there was
a vast Bear, huger and mightier than the fearful grizzly bear of
America, which haunted caves, and prowling around forced down with its
horrid paws the shaggy bull, and broke his stout neck by main force, and
dragged the body home to devour at leisure. And many of these caves, the
holes and chasms of the limestone districts, were inhabited by a
gigantic species of Hyena, which seems to have existed in great numbers,
so that the caverns are strewn all over, from end to end, with thousands
of teeth and disjointed bones, both of the hyenas themselves and of the
other carnivores; shewing that there they lived and died in successive
generations; and, mainly, of other creatures, of very varied species,
great and small, most of them cracked, and crushed, and gnawed, shewing
the plain marks of the powerful conical teeth of those obscene nocturnal
animals.
Thus I have endeavoured to draw a picture, vague and imperfect, I know,
of some of the more remarkable and prominent features of the primeval
earth, limiting the sketch to those forms which we know only by their
fossil remains. In endeavouring to paint their contour and general
appearance, and still more their habits and instincts, conjecture must
be largely at work--a conjecture, however, which takes for its basis the
anatomical exigencies of the osseous structure, and the analogy of
existing creatures the most nearly related to the fossil.
These forms, many of them so huge and uncouth, are well known as having
tenanted various regions of the earth during what is known as the
Tertiary Era, in its later periods. They certainly do not exist in those
regions now. When did their life--their species-life--terminate? I have
been assuming that they were upon the earth, as living sentient beings,
in the earliest age of what we call the historic period--that is,
according to the chronology of the Word of God, which must be true,
within the last six thousand years. This assumption is so heterodox,
that unsupported by evidence, it would be generally rejected; let us
then inquire what evidence there is that man was an inhabitant of the
globe contemporaneously with these huge giants of the bestial creation.
I do not pretend to offer positive evidence concerning the synchronism
of _all_ the animals I have been describing with man; but, as there is
no doubt that they were all contemporaneous, _inter se_, if we can
attain to good grounds for concluding his co-existence with _some_ of
them, it may be no unfair presumption that the case was so with the
others.
And first, with respect to the _Colossochelys Atlas_, that vast fossil
land tortoise of the Sewalik hills, in the north of India, whose
carapace may have covered an area of twelve or fifteen feet in diameter,
and whose entire length, as in walking, when head and tail were
protruded, could not have been much less than thirty feet. The
discoverers of this interesting relic, Dr Falconer and Major Cauntley,
have discussed the question of its probable cessation of existence with
some care; and they have come to the conclusion "that there are fair
grounds for entertaining the belief, as probable, that the
_Colossochelys Atlas_ may have lived down to an early period of the
human epoch, and become extinct since." This they infer on two grounds:
first, from the fact that, in the same strata, which are not limited to
the Sewalik hills, but extend, with the remains of this immense
tortoise, all over the great Indian area, from Ava to the Gulf of
Cambay, other tortoises, crocodiles, &c., which were contemporary with
the _Colossochelys_, have survived to the present time; and, secondly,
from mythologic and cosmogonic traditions of many eastern nations,
having reference to a tortoise of such gigantic size as to be associated
in the current fables with an elephant.[7]
Elian, the Greek naturalist, quoting Megasthenes, a still older
authority, who resided several years in India, and who collected a good
deal of interesting information concerning the country, reports that in
the sea around Ceylon there were found tortoises of such enormous
dimensions that huts were made of their shells, each shell being fifteen
cubits (or twenty-two feet) long; so that several people were able to
find comfortable shelter under it from the rain and sun.[8] And both
Strabo and Pliny[9] assert that the Chelonophagi, who inhabited the
shores of the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, converted the enormous
shells of the turtles which they caught into roofs for their houses and
boats for their little voyages. It has been suggested that the
_Colossochelys_ may have given origin to these statements; but I rather
think the great sea-turtles of the genus _Chelone_ are referred to, the
convex shells of which are known in our own day to reach to a length of
eight feet or upwards.
The circumstances attending the discovery of the rhinoceros and elephant
of Siberia are very curious and interesting; since of them we have not
the fossilised skeletons, but the carcases preserved in a fresh state,
as if just dead, with (in one case) the flesh upon the bones in an
eatable state, and actually forming the food of dogs and wolves, the
skin entire, and covered with fur, and even the eyes so perfectly
preserved that the pupils could be distinctly seen.
In 1771, in the frozen gravelly soil of Wilhuji, in the northern part of
Siberia, an animal was found partially exposed. It was twelve feet in
length; its body was enveloped in a skin which had the thickness and
firmness of sole-leather, but was destitute of folds. Short hair,
strongly planted in the pores of the skin, grew on the face in tufts; it
was rigid in texture, and of a grey hue, with here and there a black
bristle, larger and stiffer than the rest. Short ash-grey hair was
observed to clothe the legs, in moderate profusion. The eyelids and
eyelashes were still visible; the remains of the brain were still in the
cavity of the skull, and the flesh of the body, in a putrefying
condition, was still beneath the skin. On the nose there were
indications of a horn having been seated, around which the integument
had formed a sort of fold.
Thus the creature was known to be a Rhinoceros, and the head and feet
were lifted, and conveyed to St Petersburg, where they are still
preserved in the Imperial Museum. Men of science soon remarked that in
very many points this specimen differed from any species now known; and,
indeed, a hairy rhinoceros was, in itself, an anomaly. Subsequent
investigations have revealed that the same species, known as _Rhinoceros
tichorhinus_, inhabited Siberia in great numbers, and is now extinct.
Nearly thirty years afterwards a still more interesting revelation
occurred. The shores of the Icy Ocean had yielded a vast number of
tusks, not distinguishable from those of the known elephants, and
capable of being worked up by ivory-manufacturers, so that they occupied
a well-recognised place in the commercial markets, and they constitute
to this day the principal supply of the Russian ivory-turners. A
fisherman living at the mouth of the Lena, being one day engaged in
collecting tusks, saw among some ice-blocks an uncouth object. The next
year he observed it still further exposed, and in the following season,
1801, he saw that it was an enormous animal, having great tusks, one of
which, with the entire side of the carcase, projected from the frozen
mass. He knew it to be a _Mammoth_, for so the fossil elephants were
called, and observed it with interest. The next season was so cold that
no change took place; but in 1803, the melting of the ice proceeded so
far that the gigantic animal fell down from the cliff entire, and was
deposited on the sand beneath. The following season the fisherman,
Schumachoff, cut out the tusks, which he sold for fifty rubles, and two
years after this the scene was visited by Mr Adams, in the service of
the Imperial Court, who has given an interesting account of his
observations, made, it must be remembered, in the seventh year after the
first discovery:--
"I found the Mammoth," observes this gentleman, "still in the same
place, but altogether mutilated ... the Jakutski of the neighbourhood
having cut off the flesh, with which they fed their dogs during the
scarcity. Wild beasts, such as white bears, wolves, wolverines, and
foxes, also fed upon it, and the traces of their footsteps were seen
around. The skeleton, almost entirely devoid of its flesh, remained
whole, with the exception of one fore-leg. The head was covered with a
dry skin; one of the ears, well preserved, was furnished with a tuft of
hairs. All these parts have necessarily been injured in transporting
them a distance of 7330 miles (to St Petersburg); but the eyes have been
preserved, and the pupil of one can still be distinguished.
"The Mammoth was a male, with a long mane on the neck. The tail and
proboscis were not preserved. The skin, of which I possess
three-fourths, is of a dark-grey colour, covered with reddish wool and
black hairs; but the dampness of the spot, where it had lain so long,
had in some degree destroyed the hair. The entire carcase, of which I
collected the bones on the spot, was nine feet four inches high, and
sixteen feet four inches long, without including the tusks, which
measured nine feet six inches along the curve. The distance from the
base or root of the tusk to the point is three feet seven inches. The
two tusks together weighed three hundred and sixty pounds, English
weight, and the head alone four hundred and fourteen pounds.
"I next detached the skin of the side on which the animal had lain,
which was well preserved. This skin was of such extraordinary weight
that ten persons found difficulty in transporting it to the shore. After
this I dug the ground in different places, to ascertain whether any of
its bones were buried, but principally to collect all the hairs which
the white bears had trod into the ground while devouring the flesh.
Although this was difficult from the want of instruments, I succeeded in
collecting more than a pood (thirty-six pounds) of hair. In a few days
the work was completed, and I found myself in possession of a treasure
which amply recompensed me for the fatigues and dangers of the journey,
and the considerable expenses of the enterprise.... The escarpment of
ice was thirty-five to forty toises high; and, according to the report
of the Tungusians, the animal was, when they first saw it, seven toises
below the surface of the ice, &c. On arriving with the Mammoth at
Borchaya, our first care was to separate the remaining flesh and
ligaments from the bones, which were then packed up. When I arrived at
the Jakutsk, I had the good fortune to repurchase the tusks, and from
thence expedited the whole to St Petersburg. The skeleton is now in the
Museum of the Academy, and the skin still remains attached to the head
and feet. A part of the skin, and some of the hair of this animal were
sent by Mr Adams to Sir Joseph Banks, who presented them to the Museum
of the Royal College of Surgeons. The hair is entirely separated from
the skin, excepting in one very small part, where it still remains
attached. It consists of two sorts, common hair and bristles, and of
each there are several varieties, differing in length and thickness.
That remaining fixed on the skin is of the colour of the camel, an inch
and a-half long, very thick-set, and curled in locks. It is interspersed
with a few bristles about three inches long, of a dark-reddish colour.
Among the separate parcels of hair are some rather redder than the short
hair just mentioned, about four inches; and some bristles nearly black,
much thicker than horse hair, and from twelve to eighteen inches long.
The skin, when first brought to the Museum, was offensive; it is now
quite dry and hard, and where most compact, is half-an-inch thick. Its
colour is the dull black of the living elephants."[10]