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
examples that have been given were either Mammalia or Birds, (_the
Colossochelys_ only 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 fauna
_minus_ a hundred species of animals that were denizens of the earth
when it began. I was going to say "left the fauna so much _poorer_;" 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 that _some_, 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
among _individuals_ of 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, but I 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, and subjugate 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 rapid
increase 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, any _great_ increase 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 greatly when 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 the _Nestor_ Parrot 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 the _Didunculus_, 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 and Snakes; 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.
[1] See my _Omphalos_,--_passim_.
[2] The gradual but constant elevation of the bed of the Baltic, and the
subsidence of that of the Pacific Ocean, are examples on a large scale.
[3] Gen. x. 5.
[4] _Chlamydotherium_, _Euryodon_, _Glossotherium_, _&c._
[5] Owen _On the Mylodon_.
[6] Perhaps the most complete and the most magnificent skeleton of this
animal ever discovered, was exhumed in 1849 at Killowen, in Co. Wexford.
It was buried _only four feet below the surface_, between the vegetable
mould and plastic clay. The roots of the black willow and German rush
had entwined themselves round the bones, and some seeds, ascertained to
be those of the wild cabbage, were found in the same bed. The dimensions
of the skeleton were as follows:--Height, 12-1/2 feet to the tips of the
horns, 7 feet to the top of the pelvis; expanse of horns 11 feet in a
chord, or 13 feet 6 inches along the curve; palm of the antlers 2 feet 7
inches long by 1 foot 5 inches broad, some of the snags 2 feet 6 inches
long; the face 1 foot 10-1/2 inches in length.
[7] _Annals of Nat. Hist._ xv.
[8] _Hist. Animals_, xvi. 17.
[9] _Nat. Hist._ ix. 10.
[10] _On the Mammoth or Fossil Elephant, &c._ London, 1819.
[11] _Testimony of the Rocks_, p. 97.
[12] See vol. i. p. 361, _supra_.
[13] Latrobe's _Mexico_, p. 192.
[14] _Nat. Voyage_, ch. v.
[15] _Nat. Voy._ ch. viii.
[16] _Compts Rendus_, Jan. 27, 1851.
[17] _Proc. Zool. Soc._, Jan. 27, 1852.
[18] "_The_ Humming-bird." Rather a vague mode of speaking, by a
zoologist, of a genus which numbers more than three hundred species,
varying in size from that of a swallow to that of a humble-bee. But
probably he means one of the minuter species.
[19] _Proc. Zool. Soc._, Nov. 7, 1850.
[20] In the _Times_ of Feb. 21, 1861.
[21] _Proc. Roy. Soc._, X. xxxv. 50.
[22] _Ibid._ IX. xxix. 133.
[23] Because comparatively few readers, and especially the critics, will
take the trouble to ascertain what an author really means if he attempt
argumentation, generally supposing him to be proving something else than
he propounds to himself, it may be needful to say, that I am not
touching the question of the time required for the formation of the
stratified rocks in general, but solely for that of the later Tertiary
deposits.
[24] _Reports of Analysis_, by Apjohn.
[25] Hart _On the Fossil Deer_.
[26] _Zoologist_, for 1846: Preface, p. 10.
[27] Mr Newman, _op. cit._ x.
[28] _Geilt._--According to O'Reilly, this word means "a wild man or
woman,--one living in woods,"--a maniac. It may, however, have been
figuratively applied to some very fierce or untameable creature, either
quadruped or bird, which inhabited the woods. But that the _Simiae_, or
monkey tribe, were not likely to have at any time inhabited so cold a
country, one would have seen in the term an exceedingly apt expression
for "the wild man of the woods." (Note by Translator.)
But, I venture to remind the reader, there was a veritable ape found in
Britain during the very era of the Giant Deer, and of many of the now
extant animals. I refer to the _Macacus pliocaenus_ (Owen) of the
fresh-water deposits. Is it not just possible that the _Geilt_ of
Ireland, the first-named animal in the poem, may have been this species?
A _Macacus_ still lingers in Europe, though the elephants and
hippopotamuses have long deserted us.
[29] _Grib._--Probably the Osprey.
[30] These Wild Oxen are worthy of notice.
[31] The _Toghmall_ was a bird kept as a pet. "When Cuchulain slung a
stone at Queen Meave he killed the Toghmall that was sitting on her
shoulder."
[32] _Ruilech._--Unknown.
[33] _Snag._--Probably the Crane, or one of the Heron tribe.
[34] _Echtach._--From a legend attached to the locality, there is a
possibility that these were a peculiar breed of horned cattle.
[35] _Drenn._--Probably the Wren.
[36] _Cainche_--Unknown.
[37] _Errfiach._--Unknown.
[38] _Cricharan._--Possibly the Squirrel, or the Marten.
[39] Mr Curry says, "In the dictionaries _Ormchre_ is the term for a
leopard, but that animal did not exist in Ireland." But the caves of
Britain shew that very formidable _Felidae_ roamed here in the Later
Tertiary Era.
[40] _Riabhog._--The "cuckoo's waiting-maid," a little bird, is still so
called in the west of Ireland. In England the wryneck (_Yunx torquilla_)
bears this office, and also in Wales, where Pennant says it is called
_Gwas y gog_, which means the same thing.
[41] _Peatans._--Conjectured to be Leverets.
[42] What is the difference between wild Boars and wild Hogs? The
ransom, too, was to consist of a male and a _female_ of each kind of
_wild_ animals.
[43] _Fereidhin._--Unknown.
[44] See note [42] _supra_.
[45] _Iaronn._--Unknown.
[46] _Geisechtachs._--"Screamers;"--perhaps Peacocks. But is it likely
that the Peacock and the Pheasant (_vide supra_) were imported from the
East so early?
[47] _Bruacharan._--Unknown.
[48] _Naescan._--The Snipe may be meant.
[49] The term _Spireog_ is still used in the locality referred to, and
signifies the Sparrowhawk. It has, however, somewhat of a Saxon sound.
[50] _Sgreachog._--Conjecturally, Screech-owl; or Jay.
[51] _Geilt Glinne._--See note [28] on p. 58.
[52] The _Onchu_ has been mentioned before. See note [39] on p. 59.
There were several kindred _Felidae_ in the Pliocene period. May the word
refer to two of these bearing the same name, but the one distinguished
by the term _fleet_?
[53] "_Pigs_" again! This is the fourth time. "Wild Hogs, wild Boars,
Pigs, and yet Pigs." From the prominence thus given to the grunting race
in the ransom, one is tempted to conclude that "'Twas the Pig that paid
the rint," then, as now!
[54] Mr Wilde, in an interesting paper "On the Unmanufactured Animal
Remains belonging to the Royal Irish Academy," read before the Academy
on the 9th and 25th of May, 1859, to which I am indebted for the
foregoing poem, cites the following legend, which we might have referred
to the _Megaceros_, but that he appears to consider the animal in
question the Red Deer or Stag:--"On another occasion St Patrick and his
retinue, with Cailte MacRonain, came to the house of a rich landholder
who lived in the southern part of the present County of Kildare, near
the river Slaney. The farmer complained to Cailte that although he sowed
a great quantity of corn every year, it yielded him no profit, on
account of _a huge wild Deer_ which every year came across the Slaney
from the west when the corn was ripe for cutting, and, rushing through
it in all directions, trampled it down under his feet. Cailte undertook
to relieve him, and he sent into Munster for his seven deer-nets, which
arrived in due time. He then went out and placed his men and his hounds
in the paths through which the great deer was accustomed to pass, and he
set his deer-nets upon the cliffs, passes, and rivers around, and when
he saw the animal coming to the Ford of the Red Deer on the river
Slaney, he took his spear and cast a fortunate throw at him, driving it
the length of a man's arm out through the opposite side; and 'The Red
Ford of the Great Deer' is the name of that pass on the Slaney ever
since; and they brought him back to Drom Lethan, or 'The Broad Hill,'
which is called 'The Broad Hill of the Great Wild Deer.'"
[55] The Editor of "The Indian Field;" in the _Zoologist_, p. 6427.
[56] The Welsh "Triads," supposed to have been compiled in the seventh
century, say that "the Kymri, a Celtic tribe, first inhabited Britain;
before them were no men here, but only bears, wolves, beavers, and oxen
with high prominences." Were these Bisons?
[57] See Vol. i, 203, _supra_.
[58] This is the more interesting because it includes the _Urus_ as well
as the "_Schelch_," which latter, though the meaning of the word is not
certain, some are disposed to identify with the Giant Deer of Ireland.
[59] See note [56] on p. 68.
[60] M.S. H. ii. 13.
[61] _Blackwood's Magazine_, January 1849.
[62] "Travels," 4th ed., 1677.
[63] Sloane MSS., No. 1839.
[64] _Zoologist_, p. 4298.
[65] _British Birds_, iii. 477, (Ed. 2.)
[66] Dr Charlton, in the _Trans. Tyneside Nat. Hist. Soc._
[67] _Nat. Voy._, ch. ix.
[68] Lecture; reported in the _Athenaeum_ for May 21, 1859.
[69] _Nat. Voyage_, ch. viii.
II.
THE MARVELLOUS.
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 to _false_ causes, 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 own _non-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, absolutely
_all_, 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 see any 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,
especially _dried_ blood, 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.