254 



HARDWI CKE ' S S CJE NCE- GOSSIP. 



•waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature 

 that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth 

 in the open firmament of heaven." 



That the clergy fed on the barnacle goose during 

 Lent, we have conclusive evidence. The great divine 

 Giraldiis Cambrcnsis (or Gerald de Barri), who 

 flourished between A.D. 1 147-1222, does not attempt 

 to disprove the miraculous origin of the barnacle 

 goose, but he warns the Irish priests especially to 

 abstain from dining off it during Lent on the plea 

 that it was fish and not flesh, and describes an 

 analogous case to support his words ; " If a man 

 during Lent were to dine off a leg of Adam, who 

 was not born of flesh either, we should not consider 

 him innocent of having eaten what is flesh." 



One of the earliest references to this obvious fable 

 is found in "The Voiage and Travaile of Sir John 

 ^laundeville Kt., " written in 1356 and dedicated to 

 -Edward III., and is as follows : " And natheless 

 I tolde hem, of als gret a marvylle to him, that is 

 amonges us ; and that was of the Bernakes. For I 

 ■tolde hem, that in our contree weren trees, that beren 

 a fruyt, that becomen briddes fleeynge ; and tho that 

 fellen in the water, lyven ; and thei that fallen on the 

 erthe, dyen anon : and the ben right gode to mannes 

 mete. And here of had thei gret marvaylle that some 

 of him trowed, it were an impossible thing to be." 

 .Sir John's geographical position at the time he related 

 this "marvaylle" is best defined in his own words : 

 " In pasynge be the Lond of Cathaye toward the 

 highe Ynde, and toward Bacharye, men passen to a 

 kyngdom that man clepen Caldilhe ; that is, a full 

 fair contree." It was in this country that .Sir John 

 ^' astonished the natives." 



Another writer, Baptisma Porta, states in his 

 "Natural Magic": "Late writers report that not 

 only in Scotland, but also in the river Thames by 

 London, there is a kind of shell-fish in a two-leaved 

 shall that hath a foot full of plaits and wrinkles . . . 

 They commonly stick to the keel of some old ships. 

 .... Some say they come of worms, some of the 

 boughs of trees which fall into the sea ; if any of them 

 be cast upon land, they die ; but they which are 

 swallowed still into the sea live and get out of their 

 shells and grow to be ducks or such like birds." 



The next witness is John Gerarde, Master in 

 Chirurgerie, the author of a "Herbal, or General 

 History of Plants," (pubhshed in 1597), who gives us 

 therein a chapter headed, "Of the Goose-tree, 

 Barnacle-tree, or the tree bearing geese " and fully 

 discusses the subject in the following terms : 



" There are founde in the north parts of Scotland, 

 and the islands adiacent, called Orchades, certaine 

 trees, whereon doe growe certaine shell-fishes, of a 

 white colour, tending to russet ; wherein are con- 

 teiiied little lining creatures ; which shels in time of 

 maturitie doe open and out of them grow those little 

 lining things ; which falling into the water doe become 

 foules, whom we call Barnakles, in the north of 



England, Brant Geese, and in Lancashire Tree Geese ; 



and the other that doe fall upon the land perish and 

 come to nothinge. Thus much be the writings of 

 others, and also from the mouth of people of those 

 parts, which may very well accord with truth. 

 But what our eyes have seen and our hands haue 

 touched, we shall describe. There is a small ilande 

 in Lancashire called the Pile ofFouldres, wherein are 

 founde the broken pieces of old bruised ships, some 

 whereof haue been cast thither be shipwreck, and 

 also the trunks and bodies with the branches of old 

 and rotten trees cast up there likewise, whereon is 

 founde a certain spume or froth, that in time 

 breedeth vnto certaine, shels, in shape like those 

 of the muskle, but sharper pointed, and of a whitish 

 colour, wherein is conteined a thing in form like a 

 lace of silk, finely woven, as it were, together, of 

 a whitish colour, one end whereof is fastened vnto 

 the inside of the shell, even as the fish of oysters and 

 muskles are ; the other end is made fast vnto the 

 belly of a rude mass or lump, which in time cometh 

 to the shape and form of a bird ; when it is perfectly 

 formed the shel gapeth open, and the first thing that 

 appeareth is the aforesaide lace or string : next come 

 the legs of the bird hanging out. And as it groweth 

 greater, it openeth the shel by degrees, till at length 

 it is all come forth, and hanging only by the bill. In 

 a short space it cometh to fulle maturitie, and falleth 

 into the sea, where it gathereth feathers and groweth 

 to a foule, bigger than a mallard and lesser than a 

 goose ; hauing blacke legs and bill or beake, and 

 feathers blacke and white, spotted in such manner as 

 is our magge-pie, called in some places a pie-annet, 

 which the people of Lancashire call by no other name 

 then a Tree-Goose ; which place aforesaid, and all 

 those parts adioining do so much abound therewith 

 that one of the best is bought for threepence. For 

 the truth hereof, if any doubt, may it please them to 

 repaire vnto me, and I shall satisfie them by the 

 testimonie of credible witnesses." 



Michael Drayton, a minor poet of the EUzabethan 

 age, author of " Poly-Albion" (1613), a metrical and 

 topographical description of England in thirty 

 volumes, alludes to 



" Th' anatomised fish and fowl from planchers sprung," 



in connection with the river Lee ; and to this line 

 a note is affixed in Southey's edition, to the effect that 

 such fowls were " Barnacles, a bird breeding on old 

 ships." 



The myth, though attacked by ^neas Sylvius, 

 Albertus ]\Iagnus, and others, was defended by Count 

 Maier, who in 1629 wrote a book entitled " De volucri 

 arborea," with arguments physical, metaphysical, and 

 theological ; and even so late as 1678 we find the 

 testimony of Sir Robert Moray recorded in the 

 " Philosophical Transactions," to the effect that he 

 had seen "within the barnacle shell, as through a 

 concave or diminishing glass, the bill, eyes, head, 



