02 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



Squirrel. — A few weeks ago, I saw, what at first 

 I was inclined to call a black squirrel, more correctly 

 I should say the colour was a very dark sable, it had 

 the usual white breast ; I have heard of a so-called 

 "yellow squirrel," but never one of this colour. I 

 had a good view of the animal, which crossed the 

 road about thirty yards in front of me. — W. G. Tuxford. 



Tenacity of Life in the Wasp. — Being engaged 

 in a drawing office connected with the Great 

 Western Railway in 1841, we were very much 

 pestered by wasps, attracted by some lime-trees then in 

 blossom outside, to the extent that one hundred were 

 killed during a single day. One of these individuals 

 I dispatched while crawling over my board, by 

 dividing the abdomen from the thorax with my pen- 

 knife. Seeing him buzzing about very actively, and 

 trying to fly, but unable to do so, being out of balance, 

 it occurred to me to make him a paper tail ; the first 

 I made about the length of his own was not heavy 

 enough, being of very thin paper, so I made one 

 three-quarters of an inch long, in shape like that of 

 the large Red Ichneumon fly. This I attached to the 

 thorax, for want of better cement, with a piece of 

 prepared ox-gall ; immediately he took wing and flew 

 about the room, apparently greatly to the terror and 

 annoyance of the other wasp, who attacked him 

 fiercely, apparently both by wing and sting, the 

 latter of course of no effect on his paper appendage. 

 He flew about for over two hours, when I lost him, 

 and therefore cannot tell you how long he continued 

 active ; he probably flew out at the open window. — 

 F. L., Rolherham. 



Yew-trees in Churchyards. — Your corres- 

 pondent, E. Straker, makes inquiry for any traditions 

 or reasons why yew-trees were planted in churchyards. 

 A learned antiquarian once provided me with infor- 

 mation as follows : "An act of parliament passed in 

 the reign of an early English monarch, made the 

 planting of a yew-tree in every parish churchyard 

 compulsory. Cross bows were made of this material ; 

 yew wood became scarce, and the God's acre seemed 

 a suitable spot for the cultivation of such a necessary 

 material for the warlike requirements of that period." 

 — H. P. Stock, Bamet. 



Yew-trees in Churchyards.— In the church- 

 yards of Northamptonshire and neighbouring counties 

 fine old yew-trees may still occasionally be found, and 

 invariably, as far as my experience goes, on the 

 south side of the church. I have noticed that where 

 this occurs the most used entrance to the church is also 

 on the south, the north door in most country churches 

 having been blocked up to keep out the cold. The 

 trees being ornamental as well as useful were proba- 

 bly planted where they would be most seen. For the 

 same reason the south-side was chosen for burials, so 

 that the congregation, coming to and leaving their 

 parish church, might see the graves, and be reminded 

 to pray for souls of departed friends. — W. H. Jones. 



Yew-trees in Churchyards. — It may interest 

 E. Straker to learn that Sir Thomas Brown, in his 

 "Urn Burial," thinks it possible that the planting of 

 yews in churchyards arose from ancient funeral rites, 

 or as an emblem of the resurrection, from its perpetual 

 verdure. The yew-tree was an emblem of mourning 

 with the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, from whom 

 it was adopted in turn by the Britons. It appears 

 also to have been an ancient custom to place them 

 singly. Statius in his " Thebaid " calls it "the 



solitary yew ;" and it was at one time as common in 

 the churchyards of Italy as it is now in North and 

 South Wales. I have heard that in many Welsh 

 villages the yew-tree and the church are exactly the 

 same age, the one being planted when the other was 

 built. Another supposition is that yews were planted 

 to protect the church from storms. In statute 35 of 

 Edward I. it is stated that trees were often planted 

 to defend the church from high winds, and the clergy 

 were requested to cut them down for the repairs of 

 the chancel of the church whenever required. A 

 great deal has been said about yew-trees being planted 

 to supply bows, but is there really any record of this ? 

 — G. O. Howell, Shooters' Hill. 



Intelligence in Man and Animals. — Man 

 judges according to his capacity of the actions of his 

 fellow-men, by inferences drawn from a knowledge 

 of his own nature. The truth of this may be seen in 

 the case of a man born blind, who cannot possibly be 

 made to understand what the sense of sight is. In 

 judging of the actions of the lower animals, whose 

 nature obviously differs from his own, he has not the 

 same means of comparison, and is liable to err, if in 

 actions which resemble his own, he rashly assumes 

 they are the result of reason. Those who credit the 

 lower animals with reason, if they are consistent, will 

 also credit them with conscience. This Mr. Darwin 

 does (see " Descent of Man," part i., chap, iii., 

 p. 78). " I agree with Agassiz, that dogs possess some- 

 thing very like a conscience." In the same work 

 Mr. Darwin draws the usual distinction between 

 instinct and reason, and at p. 38, part i. says, "We 

 may easily underrate the mental powers of the higher 

 animals, and especially of man, when we compare 

 their actions founded on the memory of past events, 

 on foresight, reason, and imagination, with exactly 

 similar actions performed by the lower animals ; in 

 the latter case the capacity of performing such actions 

 having been gained, step by step through the variability 

 of the mental organs and natural selection without 

 any conscious intelligence on the part of the animal 

 during each successive generation." Leave out the 

 words higher animal, and the observation is the same 

 in effect as that in my letter of January 1. The whole 

 gist of Mr. Darwin's work, however, is to prove that 

 the intelligence of quadrupeds differs from that of 

 man only in degree. The point of agreement which 

 exists owing to their possession of the same senses as 

 man, are strongly insisted on, the points of difference 

 much less so. Mr. Darwin thinks (see "Origin of 

 Species ") that the love of man may have become 

 instinctive in the dog, which seems highly probable, 

 and explains many of the actions in which observers 

 think they have discovered a guiding power of reason. 

 In the concluding chapter of the "Descent of Man," 

 Mr. Darwin describes the natural feeling of abhorrence 

 with which he first saw the savage of Tierra del Fuego, 

 and compares them unfavourably with a monkey. 

 Low as these savages may be in the human scale they 

 have learned to barter (see Mrs. Brassey's " Voyage 

 of the ' Sunbeam,' ") and may yet prove capable of 

 systematic fraud. Take from man his reasoning 

 power, latent though it may be in many cases, yet 

 underlying all his conceptions, and we find the idiot 

 who would perish but for extraneous aid. Take from 

 the quadruped the modicum of reason, which Mr. 

 Darwin and others of his school attribute to it, and 

 we have an animal endowed with the same kind of 

 intelligence we do not understand, but name instinct. 

 In conclusion, I would point out to Mr. P. Q. Keegan, 

 that the metaphysical dispute respecting the "precise 

 nature or manner of the reasoning powers," which he 

 concisely epitomises does not affect the question : 



