So they are called; and if the almost unanimous rustic opinion, with
its ancient tradition and reliable witness, is to be credited, such
they are in very truth. Indeed, there would seem to be few better
attested facts in the whole range of natural history than the pedigree
of this white or brown thread-like creature which is found in summer
shallows and pools. Go where you will in the rural districts and it is
the same old story. "They come from horse-hairs," and in some sections
they are destined finally to become full-grown water-adders. It is
commonly no mere theory. It is either an indisputable fact, tested by
individual observation, or else is accepted as a matter of course,
much as Pliny of old accepted the similar natural history
"discoveries" of his time. He says, for example, on a similar subject,
"I have heard many a man say that the marrow of a man's backbone will
breed to a snake. And well it may so be, for surely there be many
secrets in nature to us unknown, and much may come of hidden causes."
I have exchanged much comment on the subject of the hair snake with
New England farmers. I have heard it claimed by one rural authority
that a horse-hair bottled in water and placed in the sun will become a
snake at second full moon. One prominent Granger, not to be outdone,
went so far as to affirm that an old horse of his fell dead at the
edge of the dam, and that the whole animal's tail squirmed off, and
the pond was full of hair snakes in consequence. It becomes almost a
matter of personal offence to the average countryman to question the
truth of these statements. The hair snake is a _fact_--settled by
their forefathers, and more true than ever to-day.
But snake stories, like fish stories, are always to be "taken with
salt," and lest some of our younger readers may become converts to the
rural authorities with whom they are perhaps associated in the summer
outings, and in order also to relieve our long-suffering horse from
this outrageous libel on its tail, it is well to settle our horse-hair
snake story once and for all. To this end, I doubt if I can do better
than to quote from memory a certain village store discussion of which
the everlasting hair snake was the topic. I say "discussion," but this
was hardly the proper term to apply to a general conversation in which
all the parties seemed to agree. For some moments it consisted of
anecdotes bearing on the subject, and each of the group had furnished
his item of interest supporting the accepted theory of the horse-hair
origin of the snake. Only one member of the company remained to be
heard from, Amos Shoopegg, the village cobbler, who had kept silent,
with somewhat sinister expression on his countenance as he listened
with a sort of superior disdain to the various wonderful accounts,
until at length, upon the recital of the story of the dead horse in
the pond, he could contain himself no longer, and blurted out:
"Well, I swan, I never see sech a lot of dunceheels! I never hear sech
fool talk since I's born. They ain't one on ye thet's got enny sense."
"Waal, haow much hev _yeu_ gut?" asked the narrator of the dead-horse
story, testily. "_Yeu_ never see a har snake in yer life, and wouldn't
know one from a side o' sole-leather er a waxed-end ef it wuz laid in
yer lap."
"Not know 'em? I guess not," replied Amos. "I know more about 'em than
the hull lot o' ye put together. Not know 'em! Law! hain't I seen 'em
flyin' over the meddy by the hundreds in hayin'-time!"
A loud and long-continued guffaw concert greeted this surprising
statement, a result which the shrewd cobbler had anticipated.
"We give in," remarked one sarcastic snake expert, when the laughter
had subsided. "We give in. We don't enny on us know _thet_ much,"
followed by another burst of derisive laughter.
"Thet's becuz yeu ornery critters hain't gut no sense," replied Amos,
with warmth. "Ye beleve jest wut ennybody tells ye, or jest wut yer
gran'ther beleved before ye, ez though _yeur_ gran'ther knowed any
more'n a hedge fence jest becuz he hed the misfortoon to be _yeur_
gran'ther. _My_ gran'ther sed so tew. But what on't? He warn't to
blame. He didn't know no better. I _do_. Yeu say them snakes come from
hoss-har. Like nuff they ain't one o' ye but b'leeves fer a fac' thet
ef yer old har-cloth sofy wuz put to soak it wou'd all squirm off
overnight. Ye see these ar har snakes in the hoss-trawf, and thet's
_enuff_ fer ye. Immejetly yeu hev yer 'hoss-har snake,' 'n' you're so
sot they ain't no livin' with ye."
And so he went on, with occasional exclamatory or chaffing
interruptions.
"Oh yis! Yeu know all about 'em, jest becuz ye hed a gran'ther who wuz
a dunceheels. Nobody kin teech ye nothin', but _I'll_ tek a leetle o'
the conceit out o' ye afore I'm done with ye. Wut I know I _know_, 'n'
wut I say I kin prove. 'N' if none o' yeu idjits hain't seen them har
snakes a-flyin' over the meddy ez I sed, then ye _don't know nothin'
about 'em_. I tell ye I've seen 'em 'n' caught 'em!"
"Say, Amos," slyly asked a jibing neighbor at his elbow, "wut did ye
hev in the hayin'-pail that day?"
"Waal," drawled Amos, after the momentary laughter had subsided,
"wutever it wuz, it 'd do yeu a power o' good ef yeu'd take one long
pull on't. It would be a eye-opener fer ye, p'r'aps, 'n' yeu'd _larn_
suthin'. You've ben fed with a spoon all yer life, 'n' ye swaller
wutever they give ye without lookin'. Thet's wut ails _yeu_. Say," he
continued, trying to get in a word edgewise in the prevalent hilarious
din, "you idjits er havin' a mighty sight o' fun over this 'ere! I'll
give ye a chance to show which on ye is the biggest fool. Doos any one
o' ye want to bet me that ye ain't a pack o' dunces? Which on ye 'll
bet me a scythe that wut I say about these ar flyin' snakes is all
poppycut? Come, naow, I'm talkin' bizniss, and if ye ain't a lot o'
cowards, p'r'aps you'll _prove_ thet ye ain't. I say them snakes wuz
a-flyin' around ez fast ez grasshoppers all over the meddy, 'n' ar
flyin' thar naow, like all-possessed, 'n' I kin _prove_ it. Naow who
sez I _kain't_, and will wager me a new scythe on't?"
A momentary lull followed this challenge, but the bet was promptly
taken by several of the company, the "dead-horse" story-teller being
the first to rise to the bait.
In a moment Amos had left the store, and within a half-hour (barely
long enough for him to have reached his home and returned) he
reappeared with a box containing the "proofs" of his remarkable
statement.
He won his bet, having introduced his sceptical hearers to the two
prime authorities that knew more about hair snakes than all the rustic
wiseacres or scientific professors put together, for his box was
filled with grasshoppers and black crickets, including one or two
specimens specially preserved in a small vial of alcohol, to show the
parasitic snake coiled in its close spiral.
It is reported that Amos never got his scythe, however, the
"dead-horse" story-teller having backed out on a technicality,
claiming that Amos could not have seen the snakes, he said, and that
the snakes had no wings, and consequently could not have been seen
"flying" over the meadow; but the cobbler was at least the means of
wiping out the hair-snake superstition in the village, and even to
this day he is heard to sing out to the chaffing group at the village
store, on occasions when he is crowded a little too far, "Who sed
hoss-har snake?" He laughs best who laughs last.
There was nothing in the outward appearance of Amos to indicate an
intelligence superior to that of his fellows, the secret of his
present victorious position being found in the fact that he had been
in the habit of making the most of his "summer boarders." One of
these, during the present season, had been a college professor of
biology, who had enlightened him on many puzzling matters of natural
history, including the mystery of the hair snake, whose horse-hair
origin he would once have maintained as stoutly as did his opponents
at the village store.
My own early belief was influenced by the prevailing country opinion,
and more than one is the horse hair which I have put to soak with
interesting anticipation. By a mere accident the true source of the
snake was discovered. I had procured a box of grasshoppers and
crickets for bait, numbering some hundreds, and once, upon opening it,
observed two of the thread-like creatures entangled like a snell among
the insects. Further experience while baiting the hooks with the
grasshoppers revealed others in the bodies of both crickets and
grasshoppers, which seemed in no way disturbed by their presence.
So the "horse-hair snake" may be written down a myth. Its existence
prior to the time we discover it in the brook or puddle has been spent
under the hospitable roof of the insects mentioned, upon escaping from
which it seeks the water to lay its eggs. The young in turn seek the
grasshoppers and crickets which frequent their haunt, and thus the
routine is continued, to the possible annoyance of the grasshopper and
the complete mystification of the rural scientist.
"Professor Wiggler"
How potent and abiding are the reminiscences of early youth! It is now
some thirty years since I discovered "Professor Wiggler," and noted
his peculiar eccentricities. And simply because I chanced first to
disclose his wiggling identity on a lilac-bush, how irresistibly must
his comical presence assert itself with my slightest thought of lilac,
with the shape of its leaf, the faintest whiff of its fragrance, or
even a distant glimpse of its spray!
Yonder, for instance, an old ruin of a home closely hemmed in with the
well-known bushes spots the wintry landscape. What a place for
Wigglers that will be next summer! Only a few days since, while
walking down Broadway, New York, I paused for a momentary glimpse of
a fine display of spring silks in a shop window, when Professor
Wiggler, without the slightest rhyme or reason, suddenly wagged his
comical head across my fancy, for my thoughts were far from professors
and entomology. Following a frequent, quiet pastime of mine, of
tracing the pedigree of such vagrant waifs of thought, I fell to
pondering what could have summoned my unbidden friend, and I soon
discovered. Why, how simple! The window before me was a very epitome
of tender vernal hues--blushes of pale blossoms, yellows of pale
anthers shadowed under petals, and quickened grays of bourgeoning
hill-side woods, warm pulsing greens of budding leaves, each fabric
bearing its label of the latest color-fad--coral gray, Chinese pink,
primrose ash, old rose, and yonder was a faded purple bearing the
title "lilac," which, of course, by its own irresistible telegraph
through my retina, had called up the professor, and here he was.
Yes, it must be admitted, he is a rather unceremonious and promiscuous
professor, but I can nevertheless recommend him to our young people as
a most amusing and entertaining character. As I have said, I first
made his acquaintance over thirty years ago, and in spite of his
obtrusive ways in season and out of season, I nevertheless renew our
actual acquaintance on the lilac-bush every summer, and I am always
greeted with the same expressive "wiggle-waggle." It was in early
August when I first discovered him, a small brown and white
crook-backed creature about an inch long, clothed with scattered
hairs, and clinging to the edge of a leaf, half of which he had eaten
to the mid rib. As I approached he ceased eating, and began to wag his
upraised head and body vehemently, and I promptly named him Wiggler,
subsequently adding the "professor" for special reasons which I do not
now recall. Careful search about the bush led to the discovery of a
dozen or more of the caterpillars, all about the same size; and such
was their novelty among the young insect-collectors that wigglers now
became all the rage, and were at a premium on trade. The lilac-bushes
of the town were scoured for caterpillars, and there was suddenly a
"corner" on wigglers. A Professor Wiggler was now worth two
bull's-eyes, and even two classical Polyphemuses, or three _Attacus
prometheus_ cocoons were considered only a just and dignified
equivalent for a full-grown specimen of the new professor. For those
which I had first found proved to be mere infants. As they waxed fat
and healthy and lively on their daily supply of fresh lilac leaves,
they soon reached the length of quite an inch and a half, and their
humps and zigzag outline were proportionately developed, to say
nothing of their wiggling propensities.
How well I remember the "whack! whack! whack!" from the inside of the
pasteboard or wooden box as I entered the room, or chanced to make the
slightest commotion in its neighborhood, as the captive pets
threatened to dash their brains out in their demonstrations at my
approach. Opening the box, I was always greeted with the same concert
of whisking heads, the action being more particularly expressive from
the long projecting lash of hairs, an inch and a quarter in length,
with which the caterpillar's head was provided. One singular feature
of these hairs had always puzzled me in the earlier life of the
caterpillar, but was soon explained by close observation. At intervals
of every quarter of an inch or so in the length of the slender tuft we
find, in perfect specimens, a tiny brown speck--perhaps three or
four--graduating in size to the tip of the hairs, where the atom is
scarcely visible, or generally absent. A careful examination of their
shape revealed the fact that they were exactly like the heads of the
younger caterpillars in all their stages, and their presence and
successive accumulation were readily explained by the moulting habits
of the caterpillar, which is common to all caterpillars. By these
telltale tokens we know that the professor has changed his
clothes--let us see, one, two, three, four--perhaps five times.
When he first emerged from the egg on the lilac-leaf he was indeed a
tiny atom; his head would make a small show laid upon our page. When
about a week old, by dint of a good appetite and voracious feeding, he
had managed to "outgrow his skin," as it were. He could literally hold
no more, and realizing that nature would come to his relief, he began
to spin a tiny web upon the leaf-stalk in which to secure his hooked
feet for a temporary rest, sleeping off his dinner, as it were.
He is now a very quiet and circumspect young professor. It were indeed
a dangerous experiment to wiggle in such a tight suit as now incloses
him, so he remains immovable and resigned. A strange process is now
going on in his physiology. Hour by hour his outer skin is becoming
detached from the under skin, and now he is simply inclosed within its
sac. The shell of his former head has been crowded off his face, as it
were, and has slid down towards the mouth of the new head within.
Shortly after this feature has taken place the imprisoned caterpillar
becomes restless to burst his bonds, and a quiet working motion
begins, which gradually forces the skin in wrinkles towards the tail
of the body, of course drawing it tighter and tighter about the head,
and with it the connection from the spiracles at the sides of the
body. At last, with one final effort, the skin behind the head
ruptures, and discloses the new skin beneath, and through the opening
thus made the new head soon appears, and the entire new suit of
clothes emerges in a few moments. But though the old clothes are
worked off into a little shrunken pellet at the tail, the old
head-shell is still retained, being attached to the hairs immediately
back of the new head, and thus retained. Five or six times in the life
of the caterpillar this same process is performed, each performance
leaving its token; so that our "professor" enjoys the unique
distinction of being able, in his mature years, to look up to the head
he wore when he was a baby or youngster, and make it useful, too, in
keeping off the flies as he ponders on the flight of time.
But this is not all our professor's peculiarities. One day, as I came
to look at my hump-backed pets, I discovered that most of them had
shrunk a full third, and had refused to eat and, what surprised me
more, refused to wiggle. A closer examination of the box showed that
while they had ignored the lilac leaves, they had been gnawing the
pasteboard everywhere in the box, even perforating it with a number of
holes. The captives in a thin wooden box were similarly affected, and
numbers of holes were to be seen. What did it mean? I had been
expecting daily to see my full-grown caterpillars either beginning
their cocoons or suspending themselves by their tails in readiness for
the chrysalis state. Yet they had done neither. Their time had
evidently come, but they were not satisfied with their surroundings,
and would seem to wish to escape; and yet, having gnawed their way to
liberty, deliberately remained in prison! It was some days before I
correctly interpreted their curious contradictory actions, and as I
remember it now, my hint came from a spider-web which had spread its
catch all beneath a lilac-bush, and upon which I discerned a number of
tiny balls of sawdust which had chanced to fall upon it. Looking
directly above, among the branches, I soon found a wiggler, not only
gnawing the wood but with one-third of its body in a burrow in a twig
the size of my finger. I had observed him thus for a few moments when
he began to back out, drawing with him a tiny ball of sawdust, which
he threw out with a slight wiggle, and soon resumed operations.
Leaving him to his work, I lost no time in taking the hint, and my box
was soon criss-crossed with small twigs, and my remaining wigglers
soon found themselves at home and littered my box with their chip
pellets. The burrow is first made diagonally to the pith, and then
follows the centre for about two-thirds of an inch. I remember having
about a half-dozen caterpillars thus at work simultaneously. On the
morrow, when I opened the box, all signs of caterpillars and burrows
had vanished. Though I looked directly upon the spot where yesterday I
had surely seen the open tunnel, no vestige of it now appeared, and
its whereabouts could only be guessed by the slight rose-colored stain
which the caterpillar had left on the bark below. What had happened?
The burrows had been completed in the night, and the caterpillars had
retired into them, backward presumably, and then spun over the opening
by a disk of silk, which they had finally, or in the process, tinted
the exact color of the external surrounding bark. I have frequently
exhibited one of these sticks, with its inclosed caterpillar, to
curious friends, who were unable to locate, without long and careful
scrutiny, the mysterious curtain. The twig, dried in a mild oven so as
to kill the inclosed caterpillar, or with its farther side split off
for his removal, would serve as an interesting permanent specimen, the
delicate disk being otherwise ruptured by the final escape of the
moth.
All of mine appeared in the first week of July of the next year. They
were small, for the size of the caterpillar, yellowish-white
"millers," the fore wings beautifully mottled and banded with
brown, and each with three conspicuous round spots of dull red,
which feature has secured the insect its specific name of
"Trisignata"--_Gramatophora trisignata_ being the name of our
professor in learned circles.
His burrowing habits do not seem to be generally known, the only
mention of which I have chanced to observe merely alluding to the fact
that the "caterpillar has the unusual power of boring very smooth
cylindrical holes in solid pine wood." But Professor Wiggler does not
bore wood for a pastime, as we have seen.
"Cow-spit, Snake-spit, and Frog-spit"
If I have been asked once I have been asked fifty times to explain the
secret of that frothy, bubbly mass which clings to the stems of
grasses and weeds in the summer meadows. Surely no one of our readers
who has spent a June or July in the country can have failed to observe
it. Even as I write, having just returned to my studio by a short cut
across a meadow near by, my nether garments plainly show that I must
have come in contact with five hundred of them during these few rods.
In the height of its season this frothy nuisance monopolizes many a
meadow. No one, unless most ordinarily clad, would care to wade
through its slimy haunt. Certainly no stroller in his "Sunday best,"
having once experienced its unpleasant familiarity, would willingly
give it a second opportunity.
Its name, I find, varies in different localities, but all, for obvious
reasons, have the same salivary significance. In various parts of New
England, for instance, it is known as cow-spit. In the southern States
the snake is held responsible for it, as is shown in the popular name
of snake-spit. I have frequently heard it called frog-spit,
cuckoo-spit, toad-spit, and sheep-spit, and doubtless many other local
terms of the same sort may be found. The cow-spittle theory, however,
seems to have the greatest number of converts. Let me, at least,
hasten to expose this miserable slander on "our rural divinity." Have,
then, our cows nothing better to do than to go expectorating all over
the meadows, road-sides, and hay-fields? And how busy, indeed, they
must have been to so thoroughly cover the ground, to say nothing of
their surprising aim, every glistening cluster of bubbles being landed
not helter-skelter on the leaves and flowers, but only on the main
stems of the various plants upon which they are found! Even in this
little field outside my studio window, which is thus generously
moistened, what a task! Why, it would certainly have taken at least
ten cows in industrious expectoration to have left it so profusely
decorated as now; but the fact is, there is not, nor has there been, a
single cow in the field.
Only a few weeks ago I received a letter from an Ohio boy who, among
other things, wanted to know what those slimy "gobs" on alders came
from. He said they called them "snake-spit" out there, but that he had
seen lots of them higher than any snake could get, unless it was a
"racer," meaning the blacksnake, which, as is well known, is fond of
climbing trees and bushes. And later came a letter from a lady in
Lewiston, North Carolina, who had looked deeper into the matter, and
whose inquiry throws a little light on the subject. She writes as
follows:
"An old subscriber to 'Harper's Young People' desires to express the
pleasure which your articles have afforded.... I have just finished
the last, and have been out to examine the faded primroses, but only a
long-legged green spider rewarded my search. Too late for our season."
The readers of "Young People" will recall my article about the
beautiful rosy moth which lives in the faded evening primrose, and
which was the quest of the above writer, who further continues:
"I do not think you have written about what is called here
'snake's-spittle,' a frothy exudation, perfectly white, surrounding a
small speckled beetle (I suppose). I found several on my
chrysanthemums about two weeks ago, but they seem to have disappeared
now."
This supposed "small speckled beetle" lets out the secret of our
"cow-spittle." The old cow is acquitted, and also the snake, who has
enough mischief to answer for.
Each of these masses of bubbles is seen to surround the stem, upon
which it clings, out of consideration to the popular tradition,
spitted through the centre, as it were, with its culm of grass or
branch of bramble or weed. But the true expectorator is within, laved
in his own froth, his beak embedded in the juicy stem, and his suds
factory continually at work. We have only to blow or scrape off the
white bubbles, and we shall disclose him, even though he makes
considerable effort to dodge out of sight, either in the remnant froth
or around the stem. But it is not a beetle that we at last bring to
view. It would be hard, indeed, for any one but a naturalist to decide
on so short an acquaintance precisely what to call him. He is green
and speckled in color, anywhere from a quarter to half an inch in
length, depending upon his age, and somewhat to be anticipated in the
extent of his show of suds. He is wide of brow, has rather prominent
eyes, and tapers off somewhat wedge-shaped behind.
To the bug student these features are very significant, and he is not
long in placing the creature among his proper kindred. He has a
sucking beak, which connects him with the tribe of bugs, and other
features ally him to the cicada, a humble though accomplished relative
of the buzzing harvest-fly or hornet. He dwells in cool contentment
here in his aerated bath, but he has not thus put himself to soak as
the end and aim of his existence. Erelong he will graduate from these
moist surroundings, and we shall see quite another sort of being, whom
we would not dare to affront by the mere mention of such an
ignominious, foamy existence. Here is one of them, which has just
flown in around our evening lamp, and has settled upon my paper as I
write. Not a strange coincidence, by any means, for others very like
him have been there before when I have been writing on various other
topics, and are the certain representatives of that nocturnal swarm
which is always attracted by the light.
What a pretty atom he is as he rests here on my paper, clad in his
bright emerald green, and only about a quarter of an inch in length!
Let us catch him for our cabinet. But this is not so simple, for, like
the proverbial flea, I put my finger on him, and he isn't there, but
is to be seen yonder, at the farther edge of the table, the instant I
lift my finger-tip. And there are others like him scattered about me
beneath the lamp, one especially with four brilliant scarlet bands on
his bright green wings, a near relative, though I am not sure at this
moment whether he dates back to such a soaking as his little emerald
fellow just described. We must be quick indeed to catch him, he is so
alert; and while his entire visible emerald anatomy consists of a pair
of nimble wings, no one would guess it now, for he certainly does not
use them as he speeds here and there on our table. No, he has still
another resource in those powerful hind legs of his, which soon take
him out of our reach when he concludes to trust the spring. Here,
then, is one of the host of midgets who are responsible for our soiled
garments in our summer walks--the "frog-hopper," or "spume-bearer," in
his perfection. The round of his life is thus given in Harris's
beautiful volume, "Insects Injurious to Vegetation":
"The 'frog-hoppers' pass their whole lives on plants, on the stems of
which their eggs are laid in the autumn. The following summer they are
hatched, and the young immediately perforate the bark with their
beaks, and begin to imbibe the sap. They take in such quantities of
this that it oozes out of their bodies continually in the form of
little bubbles, which soon completely cover up the insects. They thus
remain entirely buried and concealed in large masses of foam until
they have completed the final transformation, on which account the
names of cuckoo-spittle, frog-spittle, and frog-hopper have been
applied to them. The spittle in which they are sheltered may be seen
in great abundance during the summer on the stems of our alders and
willows. In the perfect state they are not thus protected, but are
found on the plants in the latter part of summer fully grown, and
preparing to lay their eggs. In this state they possess the power of
leaping in a remarkable degree, and for this purpose the tips of their
hind shanks are surrounded with little spines."
The "spume-bearer" (_Aphrophora_) this insect has been called, and
the peculiar method by which he turns out the froth on the stem is
well worth a little study. He makes no secret of the process. If we
take a grass stem, remove him from his liquid lair, and transfer him
to another stem, we may witness a novel method in the preparation of
suds. And a busy little factory it is, too, when we consider what a
continuous demand is made upon it, caused by the sun's evaporation
through the long summer day. A single mass of bubbles with its tenant
removed quickly disappears. If the little insect is permitted to crawl
upon our hand, he is apt to try the new domicile. I have never been
able to induce him to continue up to the suds point, but have no
trouble in locating the place where he begins operations.