Birds and All Nature, Vol. 5, No. 2, February 1899: Illustrated by Color PhotographyVarious
History
Birds and All Nature, Vol. 5, No. 2, February 1899: Illustrated by Color Photography
Various
Birds -- Periodicals; Natural history -- Periodicals
Want of water will cause the common garden snail to go into a state
of the most complete and curious lethargy. This is the snail of the
genus Limax, not the larger one of the genus Helix. In the latter the
phenomenon of hibernation is especially remarkable. In November the
snail forms just a soft, silky membrane across the external opening
of its shell. On the inner surface of that it deposits a coating of
carbonate of lime, which immediately hardens the gypsum. This partition
is again lined with a silky membrane. The snail then retires a little
further into the shell and forms a second membranous partition,
retiring again and again until there are six of these partitions
between the snail and the lime-coated door at the entrance of the
shell. In the recess behind all these partitions the snail lies torpid
until May. All this time it lives without motion, without heat, without
food, without air, without circulation or the exercise of any of its
functions. If this snail is prevented from hibernating for several
seasons by keeping it in a warm room, it will gradually waste away and
die. A case is known where several snails of this genus were shut in a
perforated box without food or water. They retired into their shells
and closed them with a thin membrane. They remained so for three years,
but revived when put into torpid water. They had been driven into
torpidity by drought. The blood of this animal is white.
It may be of interest to state in connection with these animals who
pass half the year, or less, in sleep, that there are several species
of fish, reptiles, and insects which never sleep during their stay in
this world. Among fish it is now positively known that pike, salmon,
and gold-fish never sleep at all. Also that there are several others
of the fish family that never sleep more than a few minutes during
a month. There are dozens of species of flies which never indulge
in slumber, and from three to five species of serpents which the
naturalists have never been able to catch napping.
Apollo has peeped through the shutter,
And awakened the witty and fair;
The boarding-school belle's in a flutter,
The two-penny post's in despair.
The breath of the morning is flinging
A magic on blossom and spray,
And cockneys and sparrows are singing
In chorus on Valentine's day.
--_Praed._
THE CAPE MAY WARBLER.
(_Dendroica tigrina._)
LYNDS JONES.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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